Event organizers said the have sent vendors home and are preparing for the storm.
FORSYTH COUNTY, Ga. — Normally on the third Saturday of the month, Paula Spivi would be preparing for the Lakewood 400 Antiques Market, but the winter storm is shifting those plans.
“Just for the safety of our customers, our dealers and our staff we made the tough decision to close the show tomorrow on Sunday which is the first time in 40 years we’ve had to this,” Spivi said.
Every third weekend of the month, she helps organize hundreds of vendors in a 75,000 square foot building in Forsyth County near Cumming, Georgia. The county was under a Winter Storm Warning Saturday, with forecasters predicting the area to see snow and ice over the weekend.
“A lot of dealers travel from different states as far as Ohio to Alabama, all over,” she said. “We get thousands over the course of a weekend.”
In the past, Spivi said she’s found a workaround.
“We’ve been able to manage it in that maybe we close a little early, or close a little later, maybe de-ice the front, that kind of thing,” she said.
But the weekend’s downward turn in the weather, along with Gov. Kemp’s state of emergency declaration, means Spivi had to adjust.
She said she will spend Saturday night helping vendors move out and plan ahead for whatever Mother Nature tosses her way.
“We do have the blow-up mattresses and cots in the back and some food so if we have to spend the night or hold down the fort, we’re prepared,” she said.
Spivi said the market will be back open in February.