He and his wife are glad, and a bit relieved, that the Purdys were able to make it happen. We wanted to sell it pretty desperately - it was time. ![]() “I think they’re going to do a great job. “It’s been a long time coming,” Dave Mahan said in a phone interview from his boat, which is currently moored in Savannah, Georgia. He left Maine in October, and this month his wife joined him. Dave Mahan, who had owned the store with his wife for 25 years, had purchased a boat and wanted to bring it south. Meanwhile, he and Marianne began working with the Mahans last summer in order to have a smooth transition. “There were so many real estate transactions, everything moved at a snail’s pace,” Sky Purdy said. The corporation didn’t close on the purchase until last month. Then the pandemic, and the real estate boom it has fueled, also slowed things down, with the title search alone taking two months. Even so, it wasn’t a simple - or short - endeavor, Tutor said.īecause there’s a retail gasoline pump at the store, they had to have a full environmental assessment. The volunteer-run corporation decided in February 2020 to buy the property and lease it to the Purdys, and were able to raise $1.4 million from island residents for this and future projects. “To our rescue came the Islesboro Economic Sustainability Corporation,” Marianne Purdy said. “The income from the store wouldn’t have paid for the mortgage on both the business and the property.” “We couldn’t get financing without a lease, and we couldn’t afford to buy the property,” Sky Purdy said. But they just couldn’t make the numbers work. They spoke to town officials and decided to pursue purchasing it. ![]() In February 2019, when they first saw in the Islesboro Island News that the store was for sale, they grew interested. Credit: Courtesy of Marianne PurdyĮnter the Purdys. Sky and Marianne Purdy, who have years of hospitality experience and deep island ties, now own the store. The Island Market, owned by Dave “Shake” Mahan and Linda “Looney” Mahan for 25 years, has new owners. “Unlike other islands, which have established much more robust year-round services, on Islesboro we’ve always gone to the mainland for many things.” “The town realized how vulnerable we were, and how dependent we were on the mainland,” Tom Tutor, the vice chair of the Islesboro Economic Sustainability Corporation, said. ![]() Lots of islanders work and shop on the mainland, something that seemed jeopardized by the rate hike. Ultimately, the state backtracked from its original decision to impose a flat-rate ticket for ferries, and moved in October 2019 to a fluctuating system based on destination and season.īut the original increase was shocking for Islesboro residents, whose 3-mile ferry trip was the shortest of all routes to the islands and the most heavily used. Islesboro voters established that quasi-municipal, nonprofit corporation in November 2019, largely in response to the state’s 2018 decision to more than double the price of a ferry ticket. “I’m looking forward to starting to give some of that back.”īut the family’s purchase of the store couldn’t have happened, he said, without the intervention of the Islesboro Economic Sustainability Corporation. “I feel that this community invested a lot in me as a kid,” he said. Sky Purdy, who grew up on Islesboro and whose mother, Maggy Willcox, is the editor and publisher of the Islesboro Island News, is delighted to be back home. Sky and Marianne Purdy, the new owners of the Island Market on Islesboro, with their two children Eleanor and Arlo. They also have 2-year-old daughter Eleanor and baby Arlo. Thanks to them, the Island Market, which was listed for sale two years ago, finally has new owners: Sky and Marianne Purdy, both 35, who have deep ties to the island and lots of hospitality experience.
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