Hello we are LiB’s Market, a family-owned small business run by husband and wife, Ben and Lindsay Ratner with our 4 children from East Palestine, Ohio. We have been serving the community of Salem our house-roasted specialty coffee, scratch made pastries and fresh made-to-order food for nearly 10 years, with the mission statement of; “Creating Community Through Coffee.” We opened our doors in 2015 in the historical Fenske’s building located in the ‘Little, Big City’ of Downtown Salem, Ohio. The community has been supportive of business in this space throughout the years and it’s many changes since being built in 1858. We have done our best to keep the building’s historical integrity and charm intact by making minimum cosmetic changes besides some minor updates over time and working to keep up the infrastructure of a building that’s over 165 years old. However, at this time, we are in need of replacing our air conditioning unit. It has been in place since before the Reagan administration and the R-22 refrigerant it uses was recently put out of production and put under heavy regulation. We love running a small business in the heart of our downtown and being able to keep the history alive in our building. We do this for those who grew up coming through the doors back when it was Fenske’s and F.E’s News, to a new generation of people visiting us for the first time in 2024 and beyond. To help us continue serving up our premium fresh-roasted coffee - with our iconic, red Diedrich roaster in the front window; we are asking for some help with our investment in a new AC unit. It runs on a more sustainable refrigerant and lower electrical draw. There are some unforeseen costs that are coming with this update. Because it is an older building and on a main street, the air condition unit is on top of the building, which calls for the rental of a crane to come in and remove the old one, and then replace it with a brand new unit. We are using another local company, Tolson’s Comfort Systems, whom we have used for the past 10 years, to install the job. The costs needed for the entire project are shown here: Lennox ML14XCIS-036 air conditioner, SEER 14.0, 10 year parts warranty, 10 year compressor warranty, 410A refrigerant, matching horizontal coil, clean line set, connect to existing electrical box, connect to existing furnace and crane rental. Total job installed is close to $7,000 Any money donated will go directly to the business. Ben and Lindsay Ratner will be putting 100% towards the installment of the new air conditioning unit for the building. The new unit is set to be installed on Friday, June 14, 2024 during business hours. We are using emergency funds to get this done before any major heatwaves this summer, but could use help in replenishing these funds. We cannot thank our ‘Little, Big City’ of Salem, Ohio, enough for the ongoing support throughout the years and we look forward to continuing to “create community through coffee,” and serving our guests in our historical building that is known and loved by so many. Any donation is greatly appreciated as well as your continued business! If you are unable to donate at this time, please consider passing our link along to others in the community. HISTORY: Our unique building offers historical gems from our town’s past such as: books, original flooring in some areas, hand-crafted humidor cabinets, the original safe and teller window from when the building started as a bank back in 1858. Built from stone from the Cleveland quarries, the Thomas-Greiner Bank operated in the building from 1858-1931 when they moved across the street. The safe can still be found for our guests’ viewing with the inscription, “H Greiner and Son”. In 1922 the building was bought by John King, who changed the building from a bank to a cigar and newspaper shop. The iconic red humidors where the cigars were housed can be seen on the right when guests enter our shop. In 1924, Scott Chisholm bought the building and continued to operate as a newspaper agency, but with more of a focus as a sporting goods company where customers could get their fishing and dog licenses. From 1946-1980, the building remained in business as a news agency: Clifford Todd took over the news agency in 1964, changing the name to “Todd’s News Agency”, John Fisher took over in 1949 as “Fisher’s News”, in 1964 Jake Ferrier renamed the business to “Ferrier News”, then in 1980, Fred Fenske took ownership as “Fenske’s”, which is what many of our current regular customers remember the building being used for when they were younger. In the 90’s the building changed hands to Salem's Fred "F.E." Cope. Long time athlete, community figure and athletic director of Salem High School. Cope, highly revered in sporting circles, especially track, narrowly missed earning a berth on the 1932 American Olympics team. He was beaten in the semifinals held in Chicago but later in 1936, Cope traveled with the American Olympians to Berlin, Germany, lending assistance as a trainer. He roomed with Jesse Owens in the Olympic Village. Owens’ athletic performance in Germany shook Hitler and the third Reich and cemented his place in American history. Cope eventually went on to take over “Fenske’s” to become “F.E.’s News” until the early 2000s when it was converted to Friend’s Roastery which operated until 2015 when it was given a facelift and re-opened as LiB’s Market; a combination of Lindsay and Ben, as well as an acronym for their kid’s names. Thank you for reading through this far and your interest in the things happening in our little corner of the world. We would really appreciate your support for this project and please share with the coffee buffs and small business advocates in your life! Thank you, Ben, Lindsay & the Team at LiB’s Market