The new Tim Hortons owners have officially introduced themselves to his employees and to the community.
Dean and Olga Terry along with their four children have pulled up their Whitehorse roots to take over the Squamish franchise.
The Terry family members say they plan to give their coffee-loving customers the very best service possible.
"I've got lots of goals for the store and one of them right near the top of my list is to increase the speed in service and drive through," said Dean, who took over as the new franchisee owners and operators on Oct. 26.
The Terry family has a long history with the Tim Hortons coffee franchise starting in the mid-1990s when they opened their first Tim Hortons location in Aldergrove, British Columbia. Soon after, they purchased a second location in Port Kells and moved north to Whitehorse in 1999.
The couple ran two Tim Hortons store locations in Whitehorse, while balancing raising their young family of four children three boys and one girl and participating in volunteer work with the community.
The pair also has a long history of community contributions. Dean was voted the Whitehorse Chamber of Commerce volunteer of the year for his work helping people on social assistance get back into the work force.
And Olga spent several years volunteering her time for various school boards and parent teacher associations.
"[Whitehorse] is a great community but it's cold," said Dean. "The lack of four seasons is starting to get to me. We saw an opportunity come up in Squamish and we jumped at it because it's such a beautiful place."
Dean said he and his wife thought very carefully about whether they wanted to raise their family in Squamish, and decided the family-friendly municipality would work for them.
"When I heard that there was a chance we could get the store we looked at [Squamish] a couple of times and found it to be a great community," he said. "It's a beautiful place and we're very excited about coming."
Dean said ever since he and his wife first started their franchisee journey in B.C., the pair had always planned on coming back to the province.
"We had gone up to Whitehorse seeing a great opportunity, and it was and we loved it. But yes coming back to British Columbia is something we had always wanted to do."
For now, however, Dean is currently the only family member in town.
"My wife is going to come down in time. We wanted to let the kids finish up the school year, at least."
He said he expects the first little while as the new owner to be incredibly busy, especially with the Olympic Games approaching, but added he is working very hard to get everything up to speed.
"I'm working as hard as I can every day, and that's all I can do. I'm going to try and get as many staff trained and up as we can [before the Olympics]. I believe we're going to be busy. I can't see how we wouldn't be the whole town will be hopping [during the Games]."
He said he has several goals for the coffee shop, but emphasized high-quality, speedy customer service as keys for success.
"I'm just very customer service focused. That's all I'm trying to do is make sure our customers are getting the best service they can."
