Almost five years ago, Tracy Van Horn opened her Snappy Graphics business at a vacant building at 400 S. Sturgeon.

In March, she found Snappy Graphics a new home.

Snappy Graphics is now open at 220 N. Sturgeon with plenty of more space than its last building. Snappy Graphics is now part of a business district that includes Dos Primos Mexican Restaurant, BelleEve Boutique, Fox and Fern Furnishings and True Title Company.

“We won’t feel so crowded and look quite so cluttered here,” Van Horn said. “It’s so nice to have this part of town alive again because it was vacant for a long time.”

Snappy Graphics’ current building housed U.S. Bank before it closed years ago. It was also formerly Mercantile Bank and First National Bank. There are three vaults in the building and the drive-up window still operates.

“My husband worked here for a while,” Van Horn said. “He said there could have been as many as 30 people working here at one point.”

Van Horn said the building was for sale for several years. It was owned by a South Carolina resident who bought it at an online auction.

“We drove by it several times and said, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice.’ We always thought it was out of our price range, but we decided to go for it,” Van Horn said. “For our little building, we thought about trying to add on to it. But its lot was too small, so we didn’t have enough space to add on. So we were looking for other options. We want to grow, so this would give us an opportunity to get bigger.”

The building was sold for $160,000 by Karen Creech of Worth Clark Realty in Chesterfield. The closing date was March 14.

“Chelsey (Van Horn of Milner Agency) and I got together and talked about it because it’s been for sale for about three years,” said Creech, who used to work at Millenium Five Real Estate in Montgomery City. “We finally got a deal worked out and they got it.”

Snappy Graphics makes signs, banners, decals, vehicle graphics and T-shirts. Van Horn opened the business in July 2020 following her retirement as a teacher with the Wellsville-Middletown R-I School District after 30 years. The shop’s first building was operated as a diner, a pizza place and an antique shop.

At its new location, Snappy Graphics will have an embroidery room, a kids room and a ceramics shop that will be operated by Van Horn’s daughter, Heather Price, and daughter-in-law Hannah Van Horn.

Price said she’s happy that she and her sister-in-law will be operating a ceramics shop at the new location. They will be teaching a ceramics class there at 6 p.m. on April 10.

“It’s a big improvement from the last building we were in,” Price said. “It seems more professional and more inviting for customers to come in.”

Price and Hannah Van Horn were introduced to ceramics from a 4-H class that was taught by Lois Allison, who passed away at age 100 last summer.

“Hannah and I both were in 4-H and we did all of that at Mrs. Allison’s basement and we entered that into the (Montgomery County) fair,” Price said. “We’re hoping to open that to the community again and get 4-H and FFA kids in here.”

Hannah Van Horn said she is thrilled to be part of the growing family business.

“I just joined the party back in October, but I have been learning all kinds of new things,” she said. “They were talking about expanding and getting a new building. I’m just going along with it.”