Closure colonial shooting academy, bought by VA. Beach, was bought in the beach base for $ 6 million

The building of the Colonial Shooting Academy in the 6020 W. Broad St. is brought back to life under a new brand for Richmond.

The Freeedom Outdoors shooting range based in Virginia Beach bought the former academy building for $ 6.5 million on March 6th.

The 60,000 square meter range will be Freeedom's fourth location and will join others in Atlanta and Douglasville, Georgia and Virginia Beach.

The local academy became dark in the shop last summer after 12 years and quoted “market volatility, inflation and other factors” as reasons for closure. The facility cost the outfit by $ 12 million and was one of the country's largest inner spaces when it opened in 2012. Furniture was housed in Colony House in the building previously.

Freedom Outdoors is together by President Skyler Thomas, who has a story with Colonial Shooting Academy. The location in Virginia Beach from Freedom was previously owned by the academy of the academy and Thomas worked there.

In 2018, Thomas and several partners bought the location of Virginia Beach and renamed him to an outdoor location, the first of the company.

The locations of Douglasville and Atlanta were opened in 2023 after Freedom Outdoors had acquired range and weapons that previously owned the locations.

After being in a “growth phase” in recent years, Thomas said when he saw that the West Broad Street building of the Academy rose for sale, the team took the opportunity to buy it.

“We find a place with a good basis and good bones, and our goal is to” freed it “,” he said.

According to spokeswoman Erin Crooks, Freedom renovates the existing shooting areas and retail surfaces of the building. It will also have an archery range. With the sales area, customers can touch firearms and shoulder weapons, which is not always common, added.

“It will be a much expanded area to be able to present firearms than before,” said Crooks. “Weapons are obviously bound here and they cannot take them off the wall, but they can touch a weapon.”

Crooks said the freedom still had no expected schedule for the opening. Thomas refused to share the renovation costs for the project.

Freedom gets some products for the Richmond area from Provo and Utah Action. Most of the renovation work is carried out internally by the Freedom team, said Thomas, although the Slocum painting based in Richmond has set it.

Freedom offers a monthly range of $ 43.95 and a monthly prime minister of $ 63.95. A leading membership offers advantages such as discounts on training courses and goods. Military and law enforcement members receive a discount of $ 5 to monthly memberships.

Freedom membership extends to the new location in Richmond and across all four locations.

The location in Richmond will have around 50 employees, said Thomas. The company has a total of around 245 employees.

Thomas said that freedom intends to open another location in Virginia, but declined to specify where.

Jamie Galanti from the Commonwealth Commercial has completed the sale of the Broad Street building. The structure and its 2.6 hectare package were most recently evaluated by Henrico County to $ 5.97 million.