Insurance agent buys former KMBQ radio building

WASILLA — Along with establishing a good reputation with the community, the cliché about the secret behind a successful business usually rings true — it’s location, location, location.

For a handful of Valley small businesses, their new location answers a question that’s been in the back of the minds of everyone who regularly commutes along the Parks Highway. After more than two years on the market, local State Farm insurance agent Mike Devine has purchased the old KMBQ radio building at 2200 E. Parks Highway.

“That location is really good and I really wanted to own my building,” Devine said. “I was looking forward to getting out of (my) lease. They were great to me at the other place, but after five years in business, it’s about time.”

The move not only gives Devine a prime off-highway location, it also gives him an opportunity to be a landlord instead of a tenant, using the property to also increase his bottom line.

Along with a coffee stand already operating on the property, which he purchased for $585,000, another mainstay Valley business is set for expansion into space at the former radio offices.

RW’s Hamburger House, voted by Frontiersman readers multiple times as producing the Valley’s best hamburgers, is set to open its second location in Wasilla in a couple weeks, Devine said. Rounding out the complex is Envy Salon, which is already up and running, and a massage therapist who will open on Monday.

For a man who spent 10 years teaching in the Bush, the success of his insurance agency in the Valley has been an amazing experience, Devine said, adding he wanted to purchase the building when it came on the market a couple years ago, but couldn’t make it happen with time left on his other lease.

Fast forward and Devine’s lease was coming up and the building was still on the market. A Small Business Administration loan from Wells Fargo sealed the deal, he said.

“That helped me get into it,” Devine said. “That building works out really good because it lends itself to have tenants. I wanted to make it work so bad a couple years ago, but it didn’t. Now, I just paid my last rent payment March 1.”

Devine said he’s also excited about the tenants who are opening up in the building. All of them, he said, are hardworking, honest local businesspeople. More foot traffic into those outlets are expected to also help his drop-in traffic.

“I think it’s going to really help our business, and I think we’ll all profit from that location,” Devine said. “They’re going to be great people to work with. The salon is running now, the massage therapist will open Monday. RW’s should be within the next couple weeks. It’ll be great having RW’s here. When they first contacted me, I never though of having a restaurant here. They’re going to be great people to work with. They signed a long-term lease and I think we’re going to have a great partnership for a long time.”

Besides, Devine said, it makes it easy for him to have a quick, relaxing outing a few feet from his door.

“Yeah, I can go get a haircut, get a massage and a burger, then I’m set,” he said.

Messages left for the RW’s Hamburger House owner for comment about the expansion were not returned by press time Saturday.

While there are many changes in store for the building, one of the property’s distinctive landmarks will remain for now, Devine said.

“We’re just going to keep the windmill,” he said, adding he’s not sure whether it really cuts down on the building’s electricity usage. “I have no idea how much it saves us yet. I actually did think about selling it, but I’m going to keep it. I see it spinning and I think, ‘I hope that’s paying me back on the electric bill.’”

Contact reporter Greg Johnson at greg.johnson@frontiersman.com or 352-2269.