Roper's Jewelers turns 70: Auburn business will celebrate anniversary by giving

Monday, Feb. 2, will mark 70 years to the date that Roper's Jewelers opened in Auburn. "Technically, we opened a couple doors down at 814 Lincoln Way, in 1956," Peggy Seitzinger says, standing side by side with co-owner Lisa Henderson on Friday morning in the Downtown Auburn location at 818 Lincoln. "We moved to this location in 1974. Super exciting." "It's a milestone. I mean, how many businesses can say they've been in operation for 70 years," Henderson says. "We're honoring what we've learned, and continuing the legacy." In the old days, the Roper family – Ralph, Harvey and Brenda – would throw a big community party to celebrate anniversaries, but Seitzinger and Henderson are taking this milestone down a different path. They're holding a kickoff event next week at both Roper's stores – the North Auburn location is at 2288 Grass Valley Highway. "We're inviting people to come in and hopefully post to their socials … or we can take a picture and post it to ours; just celebrate 70 with us is sort of our tagline," Seitzinger says. There will be drawings at both Roper's locations so everyone who walks in will win something, including Roper's bucks, charms and lockets. The celebration will continue throughout the year with Seitzinger and Henderson having selected three local nonprofits – the Auburn State Theatre, Boys & Girls Club and the Hillmen Foundation – to support. Roper's will donate a piece of jewelry to each nonprofit and then tickets will be sold – by the nonprofits and Roper's – for a drawing. "Who we are, what we are, is community," Seitzinger said. "We're partnering with each of them to put the word out, sell tickets and raise some money for each of them." The idea was theirs – "All of our best ideas are a package deal," Seitzinger says – and an extension of what they learned from the Ropers. "It's important to us that Lisa and Peggy buying Roper's Jewelers wasn't just buying our jobs," Seitzinger says. "It wasn't just being able to say we own Roper's Jewelers. It was buying into a way of community. It was furthering the way that Ralph and Harvey and Brenda taught us how to do business, how to be contributing parts of community; all of that goes together."