“I love running a business,” said Barb Flynn. “I used to be a teacher and it gives me the ability to still teach, but on a different level … interacting with the customers and just being creative.”
This is the second location for the business. The first opened in 2013 at 3616 Jessup Road in the Hamilton County community of White Oak.
They picked Liberty Twp. over Harrison, West Chester Twp. and the Tri-County area because of Liberty Center being nearby and because of continued residential growth here.
“That really created an atmosphere for us to expand,” Darren Flynn said. “Marketing is all about location … and this was a perfect location given that Yankee Road here is probably one of the main thoroughfares into all the new housing developments going on in this area.”
Besides pottery, the business also offers wooden wall/door hangings, bottle slumping, glass fusing and more. Wine glass painting is coming soon.
The Flynns say they never could have opened the new business without the help of friends Bob Brueneman, Dennis Schwettman and Mike Aufderbeck, who stepped up to help out while Darren Flynn underwent bile duct cancer treatments.
“My wife basically had a list for them and they did it all,” Darren Flynn said. “They really stepped up.”
“We couldn’t have done it without them,” Barb Flynn said of the trio’s extreme act of kindness.
The couple said they want to perform acts of kindness of their own. They’re encouraging patrons to distribute an “acts of kindness plate” with a treat on it to someone in need of kindness, launching fundraisers for various causes.
The business also wants to partner with area hospitals, especially Cincinnati Children’s Liberty Campus and its recently opened Proton Therapy Center, to provide children and families an outlet for their creativity and their emotions both in the hospital and in their store.
The Pottery Place also is working with the Book Blvd team in the same shopping plaza to create a story-and-paint program with young children.
“People just escape into the art, and I really think that’s what art is all about,” Barb Flynn said.
For more information, call 513-755-0857 or visit www.thepotteryplacecincy.com.
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