Sheila Copenhaver (left); her daughter, Victoria Tripp; and her mother, Jewell Hunt. Photo by Don Petersen
When Sheila Copenhaver was 13, she got off a bus at the end of every school day to work at her mother’s store in Rocky Mount, J&J Fashions.
“My first job was to fold jeans,” she says. “I would fold Wrangler $3.99 jeans. Then I got promoted to making bows. I just remember, as a 13-year-old, that all I wanted to do was be in a women’s clothing store.”
That ambition has worked out well. J&J Fashions today is three times the size it was when Copenhaver’s mother, Jewell Hunt, started the business with her sister, Juanita, in February 1968.
Copenhaver took over the business from her mother a few years ago. Hunt’s sister had developed health problems and left six months after the store opened.
