It's Your Business: Pages for All Ages offering used books
Pages for All Ages Bookstore in Savoy has started buying and selling used books along with the new ones.
The idea appealed to the store's employees, because they're all big readers who wind up with more books on their home shelves than they want to keep, said Robin Hayden, one of the managers.
The used books are now being stocked on the shelves alongside the new ones, but they're tagged as used.
Are they less expensive than new? Much, Hayden said.
Sellers of used books are paid with a store credit, and should be aware that the books they bring in should be in like-new condition.
The store also won't accept certain categories of books, including the smaller-size paperbacks, Westerns, romances, dated materials such as almanacs and travel guides, encyclopedias, computer books, textbooks and any book published more than five years ago.
Pages for All Ages, which is at Savoy Plaza at the corner of Curtis Road and U.S. 45, recently expanded its cafe hours to serve early risers. The cafe now opens at 7:30 a.m. Monday through Saturday. The cafe opens at 10 a.m. on Sundays.
Theater for sale
Dave Kraft, owner of the historic Art Theatre building in downtown Champaign, says he is entertaining offers to buy the building. His list price is $1,143,888.
Kraft said the 8,800-square-foot theater is leased through Dec. 30, and he won't be seeking a new tenant for after that date. He expects it to close as a theater sometime before that date, so the currrent operator can remove his equipment.
More information about the theater building is available at www.kraftproperties.net/art/.
Dental lab expanding
Ragle Dental Laboratory in Champaign has purchased the old Dom's Patio Villa restaurant building, and has started remodeling it to add a new dental milling operation, owner Jerry Ragle said.
The expansion will create three new jobs and what Ragle hopes will be an eventual change in the process most dentists use to fit crowns and bridges for their patients.
Currently, most dentists make physical impressions to fit crowns and bridges, and the new milling operation is part of the process for using digital impressions that Ragle said are quicker to do and more precise.
"There are only a couple of doctors who have digital impression-taking service, but we hope to see that grow," Ragle added.
Ragle said the new milling operation will run 24 hours a day, six days a week.
His core business comes from about 100 dentists in the area, though his company also does occasional work for a few hundred other dentists, he said.
He will be using about 1,100 square feet of the old Dom's building and is making the remaining 1,800 square feet available for lease by another tenant, he said.
Drive-through added
The Panera Bread restaurant at 1903 Convenience Place (near Market Place Mall) in Champaign has added a drive-through.
The drive-through window is open the same hours as the restaurant: 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday, according to manager Erica Bohn.
Menswear store staying open
The S&K Menswear store at Champaign's Market View Shopping Center will remain open, even though S&K stores in Springfield, Forsyth and Bloomington-Normal are set to close by the end of the month.
The Virginia-based chain adopted a plan last year that calls for significantly fewer stores by the end of 2009, said Bryan Kipp, S&K's vice president of marketing. So far, the chain has closed 19 stores.
Kipp called the closings "the product of tough business."
S&K is focusing on profitable locations and changing the mix of merchandise to include more "casual, social-occasion looks," he said.
Are you opening a new business or changing something at your existing business? Debra Pressey can be reached by phone at 351-5229 or 800-252-3346; by e-mail at dpressey@news-gazette.com; or by regular mail at The News-Gazette, c/o It's Your Business column, P.O. Box 677, Champaign, IL 61824-0677.
Also on this date
- Police, justice officials scramble to comply with GPS law
- Champaign police warn of banking text-message scam
- Local groups join in worldwide rallies to support Gazans
- 10 area educators become nationally board certified
- Urbana division clerk found home in federal court system
- Inaugural addresses usually become indelible part of history
- Count census bureau among prospects for employment
- Obituaries