The Wizner family had a tough start to their Fourth of July weekend. A fire that started early on Friday night raged on for more than 10 hours burning down their main distribution barn of their family owned business, Round Lake Produce and Distributing.
"The business is my heart and soul," says George Wizner, the owner of the business. "I started this in the mid-70's, built it up, I'm 65 years old now and I've spent my life building this and in a matter of hours everything I've built now has been destroyed by the fire."
The family owned business supplies fruits and vegetables to stores across Michigan, and some stores in Indiana and Ohio, but the fire won't end their partnerships with stores.
"We have many, many good accounts," says Wizner, "they certainly will stay with us, that's a very encouraging thing."
The business will temporarily stop operations, but they're already looking forward to how they can get back onto their feet.
FOX 47 News was told that they will look to find a temporary place as they wait on the barn to be rebuilt. The family will have to work with insurance to get everything rolling again.
Wizner says, "what we're going to have to do now is step back, deal with the insurance, and then we're going to start over again."
While many might call it quits after a catastrophic event like this, Wizner believes that it's important to rebuild it for the family.
"We're going to rebuild it for our family," he says, "and for all the gals and men that work for us."
