BJDivas Post-Flood Relief Fund

On February 6th, at around 5:00 PM, it was business as usual at BJDivas when a deafening shrill sounded. It was a small business' worst nightmare: fire alarms, when no drill had been planned. As we rushed about trying to figure out the location of the fire while simultaneously trying to secure our merchandise, we heard the opposite of fire crackling: water dripping. The dripping quickly became huge streams pouring out from above,  from light fixtures, vents, even electrical outlets. We cut the power while putting out all the buckets and pans we had. Soon, the number of leaks demanded all of the cooking pots, and still there was more coming down uncaught. We rigged up plastic bags in empty boxes to try to mitigate the situation, but it wasn't enough. 

Despite promises of showing up much earlier, it took a restoration team an hour to show. There was a big fire in another part of the city, and that's where they were all tied up. After the restoration team finally arrived, they couldn't start work until an insurance assessor came in. Being Saturday night, none wanted to come in, but we were able to get them to agree to do allow the restoration team to do their work. However, before that could happen, a pack out team was needed to come in and remove everything in the space. We tried all the businesses that provide pack out service in the area, but the soonest anyone could come in is Monday the 8th.

Thus, we were left to do what we could on our own. Thankfully, we'd handled things so that none of the merchandise is damaged, but unfortunately the flooding has taken its toll on our packing material. It remains to be seen what other unpleasant surprises may await us but what we do know is that we have to relocate again as the location that we've been in for less than a year needs at least 3 months to repair. 

Needless to say, this has a big impact on our functionality. 2020 was a very difficult year for us, and just as we were finding our footing again, this disaster struck. This unfortunate circumstance was something that we were going to try to shoulder alone, but many of our kind supporters expressed a desire to help, and well, we could use the help. We're not sure what to set the goal to, and since gofundme won't allow an open ended amount, we've chosen an arbitrary number. 

As always, we appreciate your kindness and understanding, and will strive to be back to normal as fast we can.