WAUPUN — Local flower shop Rens Floral just purchased one of Waupun’s most historic downtown buildings, the State Bank building formerly owned by K’s Boutique.
The purchase of 317 E Main Street by Rens Floral was announced Thursday morning in a Facebook post to their page. The announcement was posted the day after the papers were signed and the keys turned over to the new owner, Heidi Braker.
“The previous owner of the building approached me and asked if I was interested and I went and looked at it and put an offer right away,” Braker said. “They had known I was interested as I’d been in there before as a shopper. It’s such a cool building, there’s not really any other ones like it.”
Having seen how much work K’s Boutique put into renovating the historic property, Heidi hopes to maintain the historical atmosphere. One thing that they would like to do is put their workspace in public view so shoppers can watch as they put together arrangements so workers can have more interaction with customers.
As for what motivated her to take the leap into purchasing the building, Heidi said they were just in the right place for it.
“I wasn’t really looking, I guess I was just kind of, ‘let’s see what happens,’ Heidi said. “Really I was open to anything and I was open to even keeping this location here and maybe opening like a satellite location in Beaver Dam, but there’s a lot of logistics of it that weren’t quite falling into place. So there was talk about like, okay, maybe at least then I’d at least own something and I could rent that out until I am ready to go there, right? But then this came up and I was like, you know, no, I’m here, I’m going for it.”
“You know, even just going in there now it’s completely empty in there, it echos and everything, but it already feels like it’s home a little bit, it just feels good,” she said.
Heidi has owned Rens Floral for over five years, which will be six this January. She purchased the business from Lisa Rens after working under her for many years, starting as her first job back in high school.
According to Heidi, Lisa started the business as a floral department at the grocery store that used to be where Tractor Supply is now, but it eventually grew into its own business.
While Heidi didn’t have a set date for when Rens Floral would be officially moving into the new building, she said that renovation work will likely begin next week. The new space is about 2700 square feet, has more storage, and is in the heart of downtown—perfect for a business like this.
K’s Boutique officially closed their Waupun location on July 26 with some of their stock going to The American Alchemy in Ripon.
