By Steve Huffman
Salisbury Post
One evening in September 2006, Bob Lambrecht and Jon Planovsky were at their home in southern California watching The History Channel.
Airing was “Save Our History: A Victorian Reborn,” a program about the restoration of the McCubbins-McCanless House on Park Avenue in Salisbury.
“We sat there and watched it in awe,” Lambrecht recalled. “We saw this incredible house and we saw how this city treasured its history.”
The show included the fact that the house was for sale and offered instructions on how to contact Historic Salisbury Foundation for information.
The following business day, Lambrecht called and got the lowdown on the historic structure.
A month later, he and Planovsky ó partners for 24 years ó flew to North Carolina and headed to Salisbury, fully expecting to purchase the house they’d seen on The History Channel.
Those plans didn’t materialize. Lambrecht and Planovsky said they loved the house, but not everything about it.
“It was a beautiful home,” Lambrecht said. “It just wasn’t for us.”
But Salisbury, it turns out, was.
Lambrecht, 57, and Planovsky, 45, spent five days in the city, in the process taking in the annual October Tour of historic homes.
While the pair decided the McCubbins-McCanless House wasn’t what they wanted, almost everything else about Salisbury fit them perfectly.
“It was a great weekend,” Planovsky said. “We met some incredible, incredible people. Everyone took us in like we were lifelong friends.”
And so, just like that, the two decided to move from their native southern California to Salisbury.
Before they departed Salisbury on that initial visit, Realtor Martha Hawkins showed them a house for sale in the historic West Square neighborhood. Lambrecht and Planovsky loved it and immediately made an offer.
The pair returned to California where they placed for sale their 1920s-era house that they’d just finished restoring as well as Critters, a shop that Lambrecht founded 28 years ago.
He and Planovsky had operated the business together for almost a quarter-century.
Their house sold within two days. The sale of Critters didn’t take much longer.
Meanwhile, in Salisbury, things fell into place equally quickly.
They closed on their West Square house in February and this past summer purchased the shop at 125 S. Main St. that had previously housed Queen’s Gift Shoppe, a business that had relocated just a block down the street.
Lambrecht and Planovsky had developed a business plan for the shop and presented it to officials with Downtown Salisbury Inc., the organization that was handling its sale.
The offer and business plan made by Lambrecht and Planovsky were chosen from several proposals offered for the property.
A renovation of the building took a little longer than expected, bumping back the opening of the business by a couple of months.
On Nov. 9, the business ó which maintains the Critters name that Lambrecht and Planovsky had used in California ó opened in downtown Salisbury.
Business, Lambrecht and Planovsky said, in the short time they’ve been opened, is booming.”Within a year, we’ve done a lot,” Planovsky said in something of an understatement.
Their business, the pair said, is modeled largely after the shop they operated in California, just outside Los Angeles.
“Ninety to 95 percent of what we have for sale here is the same as what we had in California,” Lambrecht said.
The pair’s California store was a trendy one, attracting Hollywood stars like Sally Field.
Locals would probably call the Salisbury Critters ó which measures 2,550 feet ó a “card and gift shop.” Those in the industry might refer to it as a “trend store,” showcasing the latest items that are hot sellers.
Critters includes rows and rows of greeting cards. Really funny ones.
There’s a variety of jewelry and calendars for sale. Knickknacks of all descriptions are included. The decor is bright and colorful. Employees seem to be sincerely interested in helping customers.
“We truly understand the meaning of customer service,” Planovsky said.
Outside the store’s front door is “The Champion,” a mechanical horse that dates to the early 1950s. Children are drawn to the inanimate stallion that’s posed forever in full gallop. The horse is the same that their grandparents probably rode when they were young.
Rides are 25 cents.
Lambrecht said the horse is a perfectly-restored creation that he purchased from a company in Portland, Ore.
“We had a similar one at our store in California,” he said. “It sort of became our trademark.”
Lambrecht and Planovsky both said things are working out far better in Salisbury than they’d dreamed. They love the change of seasons, they said, and the easygoing Southern charm of their new community.
Lambrecht recalled that he had to return to California recently to tie up a few bookkeeping matters.
He said that after three days, he was itching to get back to Salisbury.
“I couldn’t wait to get home,” Lambrecht said.
Jack Thomson, executive director of Historic Salisbury Foundation, said he’s pleased that Lambrecht and Planovsky decided to relocate to Rowan County despite the fact that their initial plans to purchase the McCubbins-McCanless House didn’t materialize.
“I feel like Historic Salisbury Foundation brought them here,” Thomson said. “We feel we served our mission.”
Lambrecht and Planovsky said they’re sometimes asked why they didn’t hold onto their house in California, just renting it rather than selling it in the event that things in North Carolina went bust.
They said they never considered doing so.
“You don’t go forward in life in order to go backward,” Planovsky said. “We’re here. We’re committed to this community.”
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Contact Steve Huffman at 704-797-4222 or shuffman@salisburypost.com.