Moving on over

Heather Olgestone is in the process of moving all her equipment to the new location, including the dryer, which runs t-shirts through the machine for over a minute and a half at a temperature of 350 degrees. — Trevor Crawley

Mega Silk Screening has moved into new digs and switched ownership to a long-time employee.

A long-standing Cranbrook business has been taken over by a familiar face to Blair and Toni Meggison, the previous owners. Heather Oglestone has worked with the couple at the business for the last 15 years and has been quietly groomed to run the shop when the Meggisons felt the call of retirement.

Moving to a new location makes more economical sense to Oglestone because the smaller space suits the downsizing that comes when two employees, or in this case, owners, leave the workforce and turn the page to the next chapter of their lives.

A well-known storefront on 10th Street, Mega Silk Screening has shifted operations to 103 7th Avenue—a place right beside Wolfpack Graphics, which works very closely with them.

“I’ve met with most of the people we work with locally hands-on and I’m lucky to be able to carry on something like that as opposed to going out my own,” Olgestone said. “I think that would be a lot scarier than what I’m doing now.”

But Oglestone said even though the Meggisons will be retired, they’ll still have a connection to the shop and be around help her out if she needs it.

“It’s been good because Blair’s been able to work as long as he’s wanted to. He’s retired but not retiring,” Oglestone said. “It’s just that time (for him) to step away from this.”

With no post-secondary education, she started working with the couple when they needed help 15 years ago.

After her first few days, the Meggisons knew they could train her and give her all the necessary skills to work in the production area, she said.

The ownership changeover has been kicked around for a while between the three, with Blair Meggison teaching Oglestone the business side of running the shop for the past few years.

While she learned the technical skills of silk-screening, she also grew confident in dealing with customers, handling work orders and other aspects that are essential in business operations.

“Blair’s been very supportive over the years; he’s told me he can walk away and go on holidays for two or three weeks and not worry about the shop,” Oglestone said. “For him to tell me that, it makes me feel extremely good about being able to do that and keep the business together.”

Oglestone acknowledges that holding on to the Mega Silk Screening name keeps the name recognition in the community but plans to do a few things to put her individual stamp on the business.

Creating a website is one of the first new items on the to-do list and she wants to look into some new production technology to see if she can make a few things more efficient.

But Oglestone prefers some of the old-school methods, like working with a manual press, because she likes having direct control over what she’s doing.

“For me, even though some things have changed, like moving to the new location here, the heart of the business is still the same; we’re still offering the same products and working with the people we’ve always worked with,” she said.