Verizon version two

At the end of April I posted about a building that had been sold across from the College Square Mall. It turned out that it was to be a Verizon store.

Naturally a trip to the current Verizon store was necessary to learn more about what was happening. Verizon has an office on North McKinley across from what was once Kirby Risk and a block south of the elevators I kept writing about last year. Inside the building is a large room with two desks. At the desks were two women, one tending a customer and the other willing to answer my questions. I was surprised to learn that this office on North McKinley was not shutting down. Rather a second Rensselaer location was being added.

I probably should have asked if I could have taken the picture of the desks with their occupants, but I did not. Instead I took a picture of the room from in front of their desks.

By the way, in addition to selling Verizon plans, they also sell the Dish TV plans. That may be why there are so many Dish disks around Rensselaer.

Within a few days of my April post, the renovation of the South College building had begun. First, part of the overhang was removed.

Before this building was home to Curves, it was home to Stanley Steamer. A few days ago I bumped into the former owner of Stanley Steamer and asked him about the history of the building. He said that before he bought it, it was a Standard Oil gas station. After he bought it, he added the little extension to the south. I do not recall it as a gas station, though according to his time line, I was here when it was. Do you recall this as a gas station? It certainly looks like it was as the work continued on the front of the building. It appears that they exposed an old bay.

As I was taking pictures early this week, I met the owner and learned more. Verizon does not own these offices, but rather he works as a franchisee or something similar. He also owns similar offices in Winamac, Monticello, and DeMotte, and he said he likes to locate near Hamstra shopping malls but not in them. The front of the building at the far end in the picture below will have large store-front windows. He will keep the McKinley office open and see how it does, but he expects that this new location will greatly help sales.

 In the picture below, taken Wednesday afternoon, the windows are being installed and you can begin to see what it will look like when it is finished.

The owner is hoping for an early June opening, and there will be a grand opening.