Colby Retirement Community enters new era

Mark and Darla Viegut aren’t the kind of people to wait for better times - they go out and make something better.

Proud owners of Colby Metal since 2017, the former Abbotsford residents now make Colby their home, and are in charge of 76 employees. Mark and Darla have been with Colby Metal for a long time, Mark for 36 years, and Darla for 11. Their daughter, Kylie, also spent six years work there as well.

“We’re here to stay, not fly by the night,” Darla said in an interview with the Tribune-Phonograph.

They’ve put down even deeper roots, and made an even stronger committment to their community last month, making the decision to purchase the Colby Retirement Community. In a Feb. 25 Facebook post, Darla wrote about the decision she and husband Mark made to purchase the business.

“As anyone close to us knows, we have had a sad year,” Darla explained in her post. “Two of my three “olds” left us this year, our uncle Pete and our sweet mama.”

When the Vieguts moved Darla’s uncle Pete into the Colby Retirement Community, they were amazed by the wonderful care he received. Darla’s uncle would pass away in June, but a month later the Vieguts realized Darla’s mother also needed additional care.

It was only natural they would turn to the Colby Reitrement Community and the excellent staff.

“In July we realized that my mom needed more assistance and was also admitted to Colby Retirement Community. In all actuality, they admitted an entire family that day. The staff cared for my mom, my dad and our whole family. Every morning when I walked in there I didn’t just see staff and residents, I saw family. I was in awe of the care and compassion that we saw,” Darla said in her Facebook post.

While the Vieguts were settling their family into the facility, CRC was in the process of a remodel in hopes of putting the facility up for sale in the spring “Mark and I talked about our hopes of someone purchasing the facility that was local and would assure that the residents and staff were well taken care of. Never really considering purchasing it ourselves.”

It was a daunting idea, considering it was out of the Viegut’s comfort zone, but as Darla’s mother’s condition declined she was struck by the care and expertise of the staff at CRC.

“The compassion and support shown by the team at Colby Retirement Community helped my mom, my dad and our whole family handle losing our family matriarch,” Darla’s post reads.

“We had talked with my mom and dad about purchasing Colby Retirement Community, but only in theory, no real plans! One day in discussing the sale my dad said, ‘It would be a shame for someone to purchase it and possibly lose something so special in our community.’ That was all we needed to hear! We began the process to acquire Colby Retirement Community.”

Darla’s mother passed away on Oct. 28, and as the Vieguts endured those hard times, they could not shake off the thought of someone outside the area purchasing CRC. “The connection we had to the residents and staff at Colby Retirement Community was strong,” Darla wrote. “The appreciation and admiration we had for them never changed.”

The Vieguts wanted to make a difference to the residents and family the way they did for them. And so they took the plunge, making an agreement to purchase the facility.

On April 1, 2022, the Colby Retirement Community will be owned by Darla and Mark (Viegut CARE, LLC), and the name will change from Colby Retirement Community to Colby Senior Care.

“We are so excited to work with this amazing team and the residents,” Darla wrote in her post. “We are committed to this community and feel truly blessed to have this opportunity.”

The Vieguts promise to treat residents and staff with the same level of skill and compassion her family received while residents. That sentiment is now the mission statement of Colby Senior Care, which reads online: To provide superior care to our residents and their families delivered by a skilled team dedicated to kindness, compassion, service, and excellence, while encouraging our community to thrive.