Deborah Wilber, Standard-Examiner

OGDEN — Bennion Crafts and Frame is closing its doors after 25 years under the ownership of brothers Steve and Scott Bennion. But while the store in its current form did not come along until 1997, the Bennion family has been in business in Weber County for 71 years.

After seven decades of business ownership along the Wasatch Front, it is the community involvement and personal relationships made the Bennion family will miss most.

Stan and Norene Bennion, grandparents of Steve and Scott, moved to Roy and in 1951 opened Bennion Drug, which included the typical confectionary and fountain of a 1950s five-and-dime store. From 1957 to 1991, the store went through many changes and expansions.

Stan and his son David purchased a Ben Franklin franchise in 1957 which later became the Roy Drug Center in 1965 after combining Bennion Drug and the Ben Franklin Variety store.

The store moved for a third time in 1985 to accommodate the addition of craft merchandise as well as fabric and framing departments, at which point it was renamed Ben Franklin Crafts. Kaysville became home to Ben Franklin Crafts’ second location in 1997.

Deborah Wilber, Standard-Examiner

In the early ’90s, Ben Franklin Crafts was considered one of the largest retail craft stores in Northern Utah with over 20,000 square feet of space before the Bennion family closed their Roy location in 2009.

Ben Franklin Craft became Bennion Craft and Frame upon opening a store in Ogden in 2012. Steve Bennion said the name change was necessary to avoid paying royalties to use the Ben Franklin name for the new store.

Bennion said he did not have to worry about the Kaysville location as the Ben Franklin name had been grandfathered in during the franchise purchase in 1957.

Connie Ruesch, store manager of Bennion Craft and Frame in Kaysville, helped open the location 25 years ago and now she is helping to close it.

“Talking about it makes me emotional,” she said.

Steve Bennion said he’s sad to see the Bennion Craft era come to a close, but he is looking forward to the next chapter with retirement in mind.

Five years ago, Steve said he and Scott were nervous about signing on for another 10-year lease commitment for their store in Kaysville and opted for year-to-year arrangements.

With the lease at their Ogden location coming up in April, the brothers decided to close, having faced challenges with staffing and key distributors in recent years.

Ruesch is one of several employees who have been with the Bennion family business for over decades. She said she has formed many friendships with customers over the years and now she to is going to try to retire.

Taking ownership over the craft store when his father, David, retired in 2009, with the closing of the Roy location, was a natural transition, Steve Bennion said. “I was literally raised in the back room of the Roy store,” he said.

Even as a young child, Steve Bennion said he knew he was going to run the store someday as his father had for his grandfather Stan. But contrary to their father, Steve Bennion’s, children chose different paths.

Bennion Craft and Frame began liquidating its assets on Jan. 10, and they will remain open to do so through April.

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