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From Basement To Bank: Illinois Jeweler Stretches Into Bigger Digs May 30, 2021 (0 comments)
Quincy, IL—Sheri Busse, owner of Emerald City Jewelers, is enjoying stretching out in her new space. So are her customers.
Busse, who founded Emerald City Jewelers 31 years ago in her basement, has had four locations in that time. Her local newspaper, the Herald-Whig, caught up with her in her new location, a former bank building she recently purchased.
Busse began Emerald City Jewelers with a passion for designing exciting custom jewelry. The daughter of an architect, Busse’s life was inspired by both entrepreneurialism and art and design. A graduate of Iowa State University with a degree in art and design emphasizing metallurgy, Busse moved to Quincy, IL, and was hired by an established Quincy jewelry store. She spent her first two years on the sales floor followed by a transition to the bench, where she spent the next eight years. With experience in both areas, Busse soon realized that she possessed a valuable skill set as she understood from experience how to translate what could be done in the shop to a customer on the sales floor. Her mind began imagining ways to merge the two into creating her dream career.
Jeweler Sheri Busse
After the birth of her second child in 1989, she began implementing ideas for a transition to work from home, a pioneering move in that era. Her journey along life's “yellow brick road” ultimately led to her home business concept in 1990, Emerald City Jewelers Custom Design and Repair. The new business focused on repairs and custom design work for friends and family and, as business grew, Busse added repair work for two jewelry stores in Hannibal, MO, and three jewelry stores in Quincy, IL.
In 1995, Busse was ready to move her dream forward with a physical store location, the first of four—not counting the basement—culminating in the bank she just bought.
“Both my adult children are in the business and I felt like it was time to invest in a building and the permanency of it,” Busse told the Herald-Whig.
Even as shoppers return to normal after the pandemic, one thing Busse hopes to be able to do with her former-bank store: use the bank’s old drive-through as a pickup option for customers in a hurry.
