MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – The WOW! Factory art studio is shutting its doors to in-person customers because of concerns about the coronavirus but not shutting the business down entirely.
The store will now begin selling take-home art kits that customers can order online, through their website and have prepared for them within 24 hours. This is according to daytime manager Monica Edwards, who said the option to buy kits online went active on the night of Monday, March 18.
Between that time and when she first got to work the next morning, Edwards said, seven people had placed an order. Orders include pottery paintings, rock clay, pre-sketched canvases that customers can paint at home.
“You just go and you select what you would like included in your kit,” Edwards said. “Paint, colors, we get an email, prep it for you, it’s ready for you 24 hours later. You can pick it up here, we’ll bring it out to you, like in the parking lot or we also do delivery in a 40-mile radius for 5 dollars.”
The decision to offer the new service is, of course, in response to the deadly COVID-19 which has spread around the globe. While it may not be in West Virginia for now, members of the public are being told to take precautions like going out only when absolutely necessary in order to help stop the spread of the virus.
Like many businesses, The WOW! Factory decided to keep serving the community while keeping its customers safe.
“It’s definitely in response, just out of social responsibility,” Edwards said. “We realized that we need to close our main studio to the public but we still wanted to offer people opportunities to be creative and kind of relax and feel some normalcy maybe.”
On the first day alone, Edwards said a few dozen people contacted the store wanting to find out more details about the new service.
As time goes by, the studio plans on expanding what they offer through their take-home kits because their initial offering Edwards said was just “a get it together real quick kind of thing,”.
“We’ll be adding new things once we get a secure system going for all of that,” Edwards said. “I’m going to add more canvases, I think, more canvas options, I might put the Christmas ornaments on there.”
Edwards said you can call, email or visit their website to learn more.
- Call (304) 599-2969
- email [email protected]
- or visit their website.
