SAFFORD — The Graham County Chamber of Commerce is conducting another ribbon-cutting this week, Friday at 5 p.m. at Gila Valley Made.
The ribbon-cutting celebrates the one-year anniversary of the store that offers a retail opportunity to nearly 100 home-based businesses and creators in Graham County.
“We didn’t even know that this was a possibility; where we’re at, the location we’re at, the vendors that we have, the business that we’re doing within the community,” said Taylor Ludwig, co-owner of Gila Valley Made and owner of Lynn Meadows Home.
Gila Valley Made started as a pop-up holiday boutique in Thatcher in September of 2020. Demand for the hand-crafted items was so great, the store remained open after the holiday season.
With the volume of customers the store was seeing, as well as increased vendors wanting to make their items available in the store, Ludwig and co-owner Tricia Garret, owner of Prickly Pear Blossom, looked for a larger space, settling on the storefront at 6th Avenue and Main Street in Safford in May.
“We have been so well received and so blessed,” Garrett said. “We opened the whole back room just a few months into the opening, which is literally unheard of for a small business. And, also, we’ve had to order a second register, we’ve had to do all this stuff within just not even a year of being open, and it’s just unreal. It’s just an amazing blessing and unreal.”
In addition to the ribbon-cutting, Friday will mark the debut of Gila Valley Made decorated for the Christmas season.
