Another business has opened up in Grand Forks, filling in one of the vacant storefronts on Market Avenue.
Work n Play is back in town right next door to the old location across from Jogas Espresso Café. Owner Amber Esovoloff opened the store a week ago and says business has been very good so far.
The store had a soft opening on March 2 but she says she expects to have a more formal grand opening in April.
Esovoloff explains that Work n Play is not a chain of stores but rather a buying group.
“What it means is that as a buying group we can get discounts we can pass on to our customers,” she said. Esovoloff started doing embroidery and printing out of her home to be with her young daughter. After her kids grew older, Esovoloff decided it was time to open up a “brick and mortar” store.
“I was looking forward to getting out in the community,” she said. “My kids are older now. I enjoy people and I definitely like having a store and interacting with people. It’s a little more visible and I have my home back. The equipment had filled the basement. I’ve brought the embroidery and printing downtown and merged it with Work n Play and now we do both.”
The store sells men’s work clothes as well as casual wear, as well as ladies’ clothes and clothing for youth. “We are trying to carry Canadian-made as much as possible. We have work boots, we’ll have runners coming soon.”
Esovoloff said they are trying to keep prices affordable to encourage people to shop local.
“We offer really good service,” she said. “We’re trying really hard to bring in products for customers when they have requests so we can meet their needs.”
Esovoloff said they are constantly building their inventory and adding new products regularly.
“We’re starting a little bit small but we’ve lots of stuff coming. A lot of our brand names will be coming soon,” she said.
Work n Play does carry plenty of name brand clothing items already, including Burnside, Tribal, Gilmore, Nygard, Alia and Tanjay, Barbarian rugby shirts, as well as Timberland boots to name a few.
The embroidery and printing part of the business can print stickers, wine labels, canvas picture wrap frames, fashion vinyls on shirts, banners, and more.
Esovoloff, who was born and raised in Grand Forks, says that feedback from people in the community has been great.
“The feedback has been very, very positive,” she said. “Lots of people are happy (to see us here). A lot of people are support us already even though we just opened.”