Meanwhile, the coffee shop offers a Bourbon Barrel coffee, and people who come to see musicians perform at Smoky Mountain Coffee Roasters will often find their way to the nearby restaurant for a bite. Hazelwood does not have a formal merchants association currently - although several said they would like to start one - but business owners regularly pull together to promote each other.īourbon Barrel Beef and Ale uses Hazelwood Soap Company’s products in its bathroom and offers coffee roasted just down the street at Smoky Mountain Coffee Roasters. Other business owners view the opening of Smoky Mountain Coffee Roasters, specifically, as the beginning of Hazelwood’s revitalization, referring to the café as the lynchpin of the community. They are considered Hazelwood veterans, despite having opened seven and eight years ago, respectively. “We just liked the overall shops that were here and the people who were running them.”Īnd the early comers that set the stage for Hazelwood’s up-and-coming status - Hazelwood Soap Company and Smoky Mountain Coffee Roasters - have not even broached the 10-year mark. “We really thought that there was potential with the other businesses here,” Cormann said. Gary Cormann, co-owner of Bourbon Barrel, said the promise of the area was already apparent when his restaurant moved in. Part of the attraction for those businesses was the already established Smoky Mountain Coffee Roasters and Hazelwood Soap Company, with the icing on the top being the fine dining restaurant Bourbon Barrel Beef and Ale, which opened in Hazelwood the summer before. “It has been a really exciting opportunity because it has brought a lot of people to Hazelwood who haven’t been here before.” “We all sort of opened this summer,” said Susan Greb, who volunteers at the thrift store run by an against domestic violence nonprofit. The boutique Robin Blu moved in, as did Claymates, a paint-your-own-pottery store, and Within REACH Home Store, just down from REACH of Haywood County’s resale store. The path was blazed by a couple of quality, stable businesses about eight years ago, and a slow, but steady outcropping of shops of a similar caliber have since put roots down in Hazelwood.Įven in the last 18 months, the façades in Hazelwood have changed, rapidly becoming a destination shoppers seek out rather than a place they pass on their way elsewhere. A steady in-flow of new businesses has led to the revitalization of Hazelwood’s old downtown district.

“We had a nice street without a lot of shops.”īut, during the last decade, that has changed. “Needless to say, there was not quite as much going on,” Duckett said. When Duckett opened his business in the early 2000s, the streetscape was still somewhat barren. “It was a dying town, dear,” said Perry Buchanan, who helps run Waynesville Pharmacy with his daughter, Kelly.ĭuring the 1980s, after the factories that had once been landmarks of community shutdown, Hazelwood was “forgotten,” said Kevin Duckett, owner of Smoky Mountain Coffee Roasters. Others who know, who have lived in Waynesville for a couple decades or more, echoed Atkinson’s assessment.

When Pactiv Evergreen shuts its doors in a few short months, about 1,000 employees will…

Factory town drawing