Reddy Made Cakes seeks community help after building fire
It’s been a rough few years for local businesses, and a wave of devastating building fires has played no small part in that.
Just earlier this week, Deacon’s Corner in Kitsilano was forced to close after an electrical fire all but destroyed the building, while just a week prior to that, a fire was also the cause of an indefinite closure at Robba da Matti’s Kitsilano location.
Out in the Fraser Valley, local Abbotsford bakery Reddy Made Cakes is now going through the same experience.
According to a post made by the Facebook group for downtown Abbotsford, two businesses were “impacted greatly by a fire in the unit above their spaces” on the night of February 12.
Both Reddy Made Cakes (located at 2579 Montrose Avenue) and Montrose & George General Store (at 33738 Essendene Avenue) have been forced to close until further notice. Both businesses have already had GoFundMe pages set up in order to help recoup some of the cost and, according to Montrose’s page, the new business didn’t yet have insurance.
According to the GoFundMe page for Reddy Made Cakes, the damage to the building has made it “impossible for the business to operate for the foreseeable future.”
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The page also notes that the bakery’s owner, Crystal Reddy, has dealt with many challenges during the operation of her business, “including multiple floods, COVID-19 shutdowns, restorations, and renovations.”
The fundraiser is seeking $25,000, which will go towards helping Reddy temporarily relocate the business and rent a new space while the fate of the current building is determined.
“We have several employees also affected, for whom this job is their main source of income, we would like to continue to support them until we are once again up and operating,” the fundraiser page notes.
As the business is located on the ground floor of a rental unit, both upstairs long-term tenants have also been affected by the fire. Reddy Made Cakes’ fundraiser notes that “we would like to be able to donate some funds to them as well so they can get back on their feet.”
A separate GoFundMe has also been set up for the two tenants in question, neither of which had tenant insurance.