by Sean Malcolm
Located at 407 Main Street, the Stevensville Feed Mill has long been a historical icon in the Bitterroot Valley. The 105-year-old architectural marvel has served the town of Stevensville as a feed mill, agricultural supply store, gas station and more recently as an antique store.
As with any building of that age, dilapidation is inevitable. However, local business owners and community members, Michael and Karen Burgess and their son Nicholas have managed to salvage the 16,000 square foot, century-old building and provide the town of Stevensville with new commercial business space, apartments, a full-service fitness center as well as an 1100 square foot community center.
The Feed Mill was originally built in 1918 when orchard production and cultivation were booming in the valley. By the 1930s, the then-named Stevensville Feed and Fuel doubled in size and began selling agricultural implements as well as storing and delivering coal throughout the town of Stevensville. The 1940s and ‘50s saw a modern grain elevator, an addition of a pellet mill, steam rollers and an exclusive franchise on Purina products.
“We, as the Burgess family, are really proud that we didn’t have to tear this place down,” Nicholas said. “We were really excited about the historical value of the building. We wanted to keep it the big central part of Stevensville.”
When they originally purchased the property in 2021, Nicholas said the building received a clean bill of health from structural engineers and environmental inspectors. However, because of a lack of maintenance throughout the years, only a quarter of the building was in usable condition.
Nicholas’s father, Michael, who headed up the remodel as the project’s general contractor, explained how the building was structurally sound and how it was important to them to keep a lot of the building’s original architecture intact. The original trusses can be seen in the newly remodeled community center at the north end of the building. Vintage tin signs from the old Stevensville Feed and Fuel decorate the walls and outside, the Purina checkerboard paint scheme has been freshened up.
“We were glad we didn’t have to tear anything down,” Nicholas’s mother, Karen, said. “We just gave the building a very nice facelift, is all.”
The north end of the feed mill currently has a community center, four commercial tenant spaces (a few of which have businesses already setting up shop), as well as two studio apartments on the second level.
Nicholas stated they plan on avoiding Airbnb-type rentals, instead wanting to provide short-term lease housing to individuals looking to work in the valley.
The south end of the property is now home to Discovery Fitness, which opened in December of last year, and is a full-service 5,000-square-foot fitness center complete with showers, weekly fitness classes and 24/7 access to members.
The Burgess family will be hosting an open house for the public on Thursday, July 20 from 4 to 8 p.m. There will be live music, food and drinks.
“We want to thank the community for putting up with all of this,” Karen said. “With all the caution tape and construction noise, we just want to say thank you and show the community the final product.”