SEDLEY
Dave and Dee’s Homegrown Mushrooms, a frequent vendor at the Franklin Farmer’s Market and supplier of oyster mushrooms to restaurant chefs throughout Hampton Roads, has closed after 14 years in business.

Owner and founder Dee Scherr announced her decision earlier this week, citing the difficulty in continuing to operate since her husband, Dave’s passing in 2014 and her desire to move away and start a new chapter in her life. She and Dave started the business in 2002 and the couple had their first harvest in June 2003.

According to the business’s Facebook page, the idea for Dave and Dee’s Homegrown Mushrooms was born on a trip to the supermarket when Dave was finding ingredients for a special dish. When he found the oyster mushrooms the recipe called for, he didn’t like what he saw. The mushrooms had been shipped from out of state and had clearly seen better days.

“I could grow something better than that,” he reportedly told Dee, and she challenged him to try it.

“We wanted to start our on business after we both had 30 years of marketing/business experience,” she said. “We had to find something that we could both do equally. I did search online when got home [after the supermarket trip] and mushroom house popped up from Crop King in Ohio. We talked to local chefs in Hampton Roads about getting local mushrooms and they said yes.”

Scherr is now looking to sell the quonset-hut-style building from which the business operated, located at 30683 Peachtree Ave., Sedley.