Kirky’s Deli and & Pizza started the New Year off on the wrong foot when an SUV crashed into the building, but they’re finally starting to get back to normal.

Robert Kirk has run Kirky’s for 32 years, and when a man fell asleep at the wheel and swerved into Kirky’s, Kirk had a lot to figure out for his business.
“When a person has that happen to them, you really don’t know what you’re going to do,” Kirk said. “There really was no time to react.”

Kirk says the first thing he had to do was make sure his customers were okay. There was only one injury to a customer and Kirk went to him right away to help before thinking about his shop.

The community reaction to the crash was one of shock but everyone was ready to help with whatever Kirk needed. A local landscaping company drove him home after to get his car, friends came down to the shop to help in any way they could.

“The fire department was a great asset,” Kirk said. “They helped me clean out everything.”

Kirk’s employees were also a huge helping hand after when a lot needed to be done. They took inventory of the store while Kirk was left to deal with his shop’s insurance.

Mostly structural damage was done to the shop, which the landlord was in charge of repairing. That was the biggest issue Kirk had with the crash, the fact that he wasn’t in charge of the repairs. When the landlord started the repairs they originally said it would be ready within a month or two, but then the deadline kept being pushed back.
Kirk did not expect the rebuilding to take four months, he says he wanted to get back to his business way sooner than that.

The deli opened for business at the beginning of June and everything is exactly the way it was before, and exactly the way it has been for the last 32 years.

However, they are changing things up for their grand reopening on June 29. Kirky’s will have a barbecue, t-shirts to hand out, and some specials on meat. Kirk is hoping this gets the attention of the community, to let everyone know that they’re open again. Since they opened earlier this month people haven’t been coming in as often, Kirk associates that to no one knowing the deli is back.

Kirk is just glad that the deli is back up and running, and that the community was there for him through it all.

“Everybody was concerned, but gladly everybody was alright,” Kirk said. “There was just overwhelming support.”