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Sunshine and clouds mixed. High 31F. Winds light and variable..
Mostly cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Low 17F. Winds light and variable.
Updated: December 26, 2024 @ 11:55 pm
Liv Dunton and Doni Cain own Foxy’s in downtown Barre City, which opened earlier this month.
Liv Dunton and Doni Cain own Foxy’s in downtown Barre City, which opened earlier this month.
Foxy’s in downtown Barre is open for business.
For co-owners Doni Cain and Liv Dunton, it was a long and sometimes bumpy road from the initial plans three years ago to opening the doors to the cafe and bar this December. A journey, they say, that was worth it.
“We’re excited about Barre. There’s a new vibe of young people coming into the city. If you are a young family looking for a house right now, it’s difficult to find affordable housing, but guess where you can afford a house? Barre,” Cain said.
Foxy’s is in the historic Wheelock House on Main Street. The building most recently housed the Barre Partnership and the senior center before that. Built in 1871, it’s been a law office, a bank and an electric company.
The cafe offers coffee, pastries and grab-and-go meals from morning to mid-afternoon, as well as a full dinner menu starting at 4 p.m. with an emphasis on fresh, local and seasonal offerings.
Getting from the initial plans to completion was a bit more challenging than anticipated, Dunton said. “Every piece of this business took a bit longer than we thought it would.”
The building was flooded in 2023 and 2024, and costs for renovation and repairs were much higher than anticipated. Cain and Dunton ended up asking the Vermont Community Loan Fund for considerably more than their original request and they held a Foxy’s fundraising “Gay-la.”
There also has been opposition to their business, at least in the beginning, as several critics opposed having the city, which owned the building, sell it to them.
“The opposition was more intense than we had anticipated,” Dunton said.
Last April, the Barre City Council decided to sell the building to Cain and Dunton rather than to a group representing the Barre Partnership, which had made an offer. The Barre Partnership had used the building for several years.
The council held a hearing to help them decide whether to sell to Cain and Dunton or the group representing the Barre Partnership. Many people spoke in favor of Cain and Dunton, saying it would draw a younger crowd to Barre’s downtown.
“Hundreds of people showed up to support us, they crashed the Zoom,” Cain said. “Of the hundreds who showed up, only a couple were in opposition to us.”
One of main reasons Cain and Dunton bought the building is because they needed more kitchen space for their East Montpelier store. Dunton and Cain also own Fox Market and Bar on Route 2. All the cafe food sold there is homemade, and the kitchen at that building was simply too small to accommodate their growing business.
“Basically, we turned a closet into a kitchen,” Dunton said.
The large Barre kitchen will serve both Fox Market and Foxy’s.
Three weeks opened for business, all has gone as well as can be expected, Dunton said. “The community has shown up, we’re slowly but surely building a loyal customer base.”
The building itself, with its old building aura, is part of the draw to the cafe, Cain said.
“We are a space that has a voice. It definitely has an antique vibe,” he said.
Dunton agreed. “It’s part antique and part goth,” she said.
Prior to opening Fox Market, Cain was a manager at Plainfield Co-op and Hunger Mountain Co-op (where he met Dunton, a fellow employee), and he helped start AR Market in Barre.
“Fox Market has shocked us on how successful it has become,” Dunton said. “We didn’t advertise, we didn’t do anything to get it out there but the business grew naturally.”
One main priority for both Fox Market and Foxy’s is to provide safe and friendly spaces for the LGBTQ+ community.
“It’s a queer bar and a queer space first,” Dunton said. “We’re going to respect everyone. It’s a space where queer people, who have not felt comfortable in other bars, can feel safe. We prioritize the safety of the queer community.”
The website for Fox Market calls it a “Queer Market,” and there is a flag at Foxy’s in support of transgender individuals.
Cain and Dunton see their business as an affirmation that downtown Barre is in a rebirth. Several new small businesses have opened in downtown in the past year including a clothing store, pool hall and bar, a diner, a grocery store and a wellness spa in addition to recent business openings such as the AR Market, The Meltdown restaurant, Pearl Street Pizza and a significant expansion to Nelson’s Hardware, as well as a new and bigger location for the Next Chapter Book Store in the Blanchard Block.
“We’re excited about downtown Barre,” Cain said.
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