Bowdoinham Country Store Set to Reopen Under New Local Ownership

Ashleigh and Logan Feeny are weeks away from reopening the Bowdoinham Country Store, targeting a late April or early May launch after months of renovation work on a building that has sat dark since the store's closure in late 2024.

The Feenys purchased the property from Sam Hilling, who sold last summer after deliberately seeking local buyers willing to keep the business in the community. That search found its answer in the Feenys, who have since invested heavily in bringing the building up to full food-service readiness, including the installation of a kitchen hood and a fire suppression system.

"Our goal is to cater to all demographics in this town," Logan Feeny told the Times Record.

Those kitchen upgrades signal the scope of what the Feenys are planning. The new store will combine a convenience store and deli with a small restaurant offering daily soups, rotating salads, and homemade bread alongside a year-round staple menu. When temperatures rise, an ice cream window will serve walk-up customers. The store will also reclaim one of its most traditional functions, operating as a tagging station for hunters during hunting season, a quietly vital role for general stores across rural Maine.

Tentative hours run 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday, and the Feenys plan to hire three to four employees at the outset. Community response has been immediate; the new owners described an "outpouring of support and excitement" from Bowdoinham residents who have followed the renovation closely.

The store's ambitions extend to Bowdoinham's waterfront culture. The Feenys intend to post daily menus in local smelting shacks, a direct play for the winter and early-spring fishing crowd that gathers along the Cathance River each season and a sign that the new ownership understands exactly who its customers are and where to find them.

The Bowdoinham Country Store has operated as a community anchor since the late 1920s, filling the overlapping roles of grocery stop, deli, and social gathering point that define a true general store. Its closure left residents without a local option for close to a year, a significant absence in a small riverside town where the nearest alternatives require a drive out of the community entirely.

Inspections, final hiring, and menu planning still stand between the Feenys and opening day, but with the kitchen infrastructure already in place and a reopening window now measured in weeks, Bowdoinham's longest-running commercial fixture appears close to its next chapter.