After 22 years of service to the North Tama community, Breakenridge Memorials has move to a brand new location at 1106 Highway 63 as Joe and Dawn Breakenridge work to continue the business his parents started and grew to what it’s become today.

Joe’s parents, Scott and Judy, started Breakenridge Memorials 22 years ago, retiring four years ago as Joe and Dawn took over the business after years of working with them. The Breakenridge family bought the current acreage in 2014 to eventually move the business.

“They’d been doing this for 20-some years and are retired, we wanted to move this away to allow them to relax,” Joe said. “We have better highway frontage here. We wanted everything in one place for equipment, showroom and office.”

Old buildings and farm equipment was left sitting around, so it took several years to clean up the land to make room for the new building. Dirt was hauled over from the construction of a new grain bin at the Buckingham Elevator to help with construction. The business officially opened their new doors last month with a new showroom, office and meeting space and workshop area. Before, Breakenridge Memorial met with families in the showroom while customers were looking through the memorials in the same room. The new building’s office has a screen to allow the business to design a memorial right in front of the customers before purchase.

“It was natural transition to move the business away from the prior location, which was their residence,” Dawn said. “This is a bigger space we needed because the business has really grown over the years. The building itself didn’t take long to build. We wanted a show room that was bigger, a separate space to meet with familes and more presence closer to the road.”

Although at a new location right next to their own home, Breakenridge Memorials will continue to provide memorials at the need and then ahead of the need, restoration work on current memorials and redoing foundation work.

“Our goal is to continue serving the area,” Joe said. “We want to be here for families and go out of our way to help families. A lot of people believe memorials are all about death, and our niche is about helping families ahead of time. Those people who don’t want their children to worry about their deaths when the times come, spouses, it’s all hard and emotional to think about what they want. When it’s done ahead of time, they pick what they want. We enjoy helping families plan for that next stage.”

According to Dawn, response for the new location has been positive on their Facebook page and people who have visited the showroom have been “really impressed” with the space.

“We’re still the same family business that’s served families for 22 years,” Dawn said. “Our new showroom and new office help us continue to do that for the area. We’re really happy with how things have started.”

To celebrate opening their brand new location, Breakenridge Memorials is hosting grand opening specials through January and February. For more information about the business, check out breakenridgememorials.com or call (319) 988-4051.