Up until May of this year, you might not have heard of the pottery and painting store on Main Street. However, one fateful afternoon, an employee pouring a ceramic glaze rinse down a storm drain was captured on video and soon went viral on social media.
Despite initially appearing like an act disrespectful to the environment, with many immediately jumping to the incorrect conclusion that it must be paint, in fact it wasn’t. However, that didn’t stop a virtual tirade of abuse and even death threats from some extremely unsavory types on various social media platforms.
Now, three months later, eagle-eyed users on Reddit have noticed that Color Me Mine is up for sale, with user norse_noise posting in the Santa Monica forum, "It looks like the bad press from employees dumping glaze in street drains hit Color Me Mine really hard."
And while it is true, the store is indeed up for sale, it has nothing to do with that unfortunate misunderstanding and has actually been up for sale for a number of years.
"My store owner has been trying to sell the store for a while now. Unfortunately, she had some passings in the family and it made it really hard for her to be here as an owner," said store manager Adelaide Gault, 25, adding, "She has a lot going on … and she just can't, she can't do this. So it's really rather a lot on me that I'm running her store for her."
When the Daily Press spoke to Gault back in May, she was unsurprisingly distressed over the death threats she and other staff were getting. And even now, she appeared visibly exhausted.
Returning for a moment to the subject of that earlier unpleasantness, Gault said, "As soon as we’d answer the phone, they'd start screaming … and threaten and curse at you. And some would say that ‘I hope you die.’
"There was even a mention of a bomb threat. And there were a lot of really crazy threats, but there were some people who actually would listen. And once they listened, you would explain to them the whole situation, and they would be like, ‘Oh, I'm glad you guys are doing something about it. And that sounds good.’ So when people listened, it was nice, but … not everyone did."
According to Gault, the owner of the store is very much hoping to sell the franchise, so that a Color Me Mine remains at the 2525 Main St location. However, she says that a sale of the site in its entirety, effectively removing the Color Me Mine outlet is also not of the question.
"We had a few offers, but she really wants to find the right person, the right owner," Gault said, adding that the ceramic glaze rinse storm drain incident thankfully doesn’t seem to have deterred interest.
"What was awesome was that there was a potential buyer and they … were very supportive of us and we were going to sell to them, but I don't know what happened to that, I wasn’t told … but they were really nice people and they were telling my store owner to not fire those people or anything like that," Gault said.
"I love her [the owner] and I care about her so much, and I love the store, and this place has shaped so many individuals from Santa Monica who have visited this store and my experience with Color Me Mine as a kid is unforgettable. So that's why I'm here and working so hard and trying to make this store memorable for others," Gault said.
When asked how all of this was affecting morale of the staff, Gault said, "We all understand the hardships the owner is going through right now, so we're just trying to do our best to be a good team for her, while she's going through so much."
Acknowledging that the ongoing uncertainty wasn’t really helping mattress very much, Gault said, "I try to keep everyone in order and make it as professional as possible in this environment, because at the end of the day, we don't have the store owner, or any real management, so it's all basically, up to me, right now."
According to the website , the asking price for the franchise is $475,000 and the potential gross revenue is $562,755. Interested parties are instructed to fill out a franchise Inquiry here for more details.
