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NY Times Peoria Piece Features Bremer Jewelry’s Ashley Daily Stegall July 01, 2020 (0 comments)
Peoria, IL--It was an eventful spring for Bremer Jewelry dealing with the COVID-19 lock-down and then protests that resulted in two attempted break-ins. But many if not most better jewelry stores have been facing similar issues.
Bremer Jewelry was and is doing well business-wise despite the hurdles and challenges.
Stock Image of Peoria above
But that's not what this story is about. It is about a major, introspective New York Times article written by Michael Corkery and published on Wednesday, July 1, 2020. The article was about the racial divide in Peoria, IL, a city of 110,000 that is famous for the slogan, "Will it Play in Peoria?" It was entitled City That Once Guided a Nation Now Shows Its Cracks, covered the differences between life for blacks, which it reported make up about 27% of the population, and whites in Peoria, and featured Ashley Daily Stegall of Bremer Jewelry. Stegall is the daughter of owner Ronda Daily and handles marketing for the company. She is shown above in front of one of Bremer Jewelry's "plywood" windows that she had painted with flowers by a local artist.
Referring to the floral-painted window cover, Stegall told the newspaper "The goal is to make people happy." Later in the article, Corkery quoted Stegall extensively. The six paragraphs in which she was included are below in boldface and follow a restaurant owner's concerned remarks:
Ms. Stegall is feeling more hopeful. Her family’s store, Bremer Jewelry, was hit twice by looters. First, they smashed the front windows but couldn’t get past a metal security gate. On the next try, people attempted to pry the back door open with a crowbar.
“They did this because there was jewelry in the store and they wanted it,” she said. “It was not personal.”
The day after the looting, Ms. Stegall, 31, invited the police and City Council members to pray for harmony in the store’s parking lot. She said the group had included Black and white residents reading from the Bible.
Ms. Stegall, who runs the marketing side of the business, asked local artists to come up with an idea for a mural to cover the plywood. One artist wanted to convey a political message, but Ms. Stegall rejected that idea.
“This is about turning the other cheek and reminding people that not everything is horrible,” she said.
“We have customers from every walk of life and from every race and income level who come here to celebrate a wedding or an engagement or a special occasion,” Ms. Stegall added. “And we are a family of 30 employees, all with different opinions. We don’t feel the need to express one opinion publicly.”
Ronda Daily, who passed on the article to The Centurion was justly proud of her daughter for "well representing Bremer Jewelry and the jewelry industry..."