knoxnews.com-Rick Terry Jewelry Designs is closing its Lenoir City store, but the family-owned business isn’t fading; it’s actually growing, as the Gay Street location in downtown Knoxville and main store in Farragut remain open, Rick Terry said.

A lease issue led to closing plans for the store in Lenoir Mills Shopping Center, but Terry has expanded the Farragut location by 2,300 square feet, adding more showroom and jewelry production space, he said.

“Now we’re triple the square footage,” Terry said.

All the Lenoir City store’s employees and remaining stock will move to the Gay Street or Farragut locations, according to a news release.

A “Closing This Location Sale” is underway in Lenoir City. It’s going well so far, with markdowns up to 65 percent, with one more discount probably coming in the sale’s last week, Terry said.

The sale will end and the store will close Oct. 27, he said.

Terry said his family has been in the jewelry business for more than 30 years.

“My family opened up our first jewelry store in 1986 in Franklin Square, and that was called The Goldmaster,” he said. That store closed when his parents retired in 1997, and he opened the Farragut store at 11320 Kingston Pike on his own as Rick Terry Jewelry Designs. He operates it with his wife Patty and their sons Blake and Matt. The company website is www.rickterryjewelry.com.

A decade ago they opened the Lenoir City Store, and five or six years ago came the downtown location at 618 S. Gay St. in the Arcade Building.

While in Lenoir City, Rick Terry Jewelry Designs won the “Home Town Favorite Jeweler” title for 10 consecutive years, Terry said in the news release.

Terry, himself a Loudon County resident, didn’t search for another site but may return to the area in the future, according to the announcement.

Rick Terry’s Farragut location at the corner of Kingston Pike and Campbell Station Road is the company’s manufacturing facility. In addition to engraving, laser welding, milling, casting and finishing, they can design a customer’s idea on computer and make a plastic model on a 3-D printer, Terry said. He can test the model and show it to the customer before building it in precious materials.

“We do all that in-house,” Terry said.