After a devastating loss, Krystal Chellani has decided to run her family’s store, Classic Carolina. This past September, Dhruva and Kris Chellani — Krystal’s father and brother — died in a car crash. She talked with us about the community support she’s received and the future of the clothing store.
Classic Carolina is a popular, family-owned clothing store that sells UNC merchandise including tee-shirts, hats, sweaters, drinkware, and more.
On September 6, Dhruva and Kris Chellani were killed after a driver swerved into their lane. Dhruva was 61 years old and Kris was 24, having graduated UNC a few years prior. After the accident, Krystal stepped in to run the family business while grappling with grief.
“We are having an extremely difficult time dealing with it. We’re all still very much in shock,” Chellani said. “It’s just really hard to wrap my head around the fact that this even happened to my family and that they’re gone.”
Chellani grew up in Chapel Hill and spent time working at her father’s apparel store. In college, she majored in business administration with a concentration in marketing. From there, she worked in real estate then in a financial company.
Chellani said she felt a responsibility to take on the family business and wanted to continue in her father and brothers memories. She reopened the business in mid-October and has been running it since.
“My dad spent 30 years building the business and my brother had been working with him on the renovations for the last year so I just wanted to carry on their legacy and reopen the store,” Chellani said. “That’s what they would have wanted me to do. And I just hope that they’re proud of me.”
After the accident, Chellani said community support has been overwhelming. The GoFundMe established for her family has raised more than $100,000 since it was started on September 8.
“The community support made me realize the impact that my dad and my brother had, not only on Franklin Street, but in the entire Chapel Hill community,” Chellani stated. “And it’s just really wonderful to hear people talk about them and come by the store and say nice things about them. Everybody has been extremely supportive, and we really just feel blessed to be part of such an amazing community.”
Chellani said her brother, Kris, set in motion some new ideas for the store as he was preparing to take over the business.
“He implemented this bar coding system where every single piece is accounted for,” Chellani explained. “In addition to that he created the store website – we had never really had much of a social media or website presence before. So that’s also something that I’m learning and working on just being able to revamp our website, get everything updated. I definitely want to carry out his ideas and then also continue doing what my dad did as well.”
In Classic Carolina, Dhruva and Kris Chellani’s photos hang memorializing them in the store.
Dhruva Chellani photo hanging in Classic Carolina.
Kris Chellani’s photo hanging in Classic Carolina.
“I feel their presence here when I’m at the store. So that’s definitely really nice, but they were always just focused on great customer service,” Chellani remembered. “They wanted to make this store an experience where people would come and it wasn’t just something where they would walk in and buy a shirt and walk out, they wanted to connect with the community and get to know the customers and ask them questions and see what they were looking for. So every day that I’m here, I always try to do that.”
Classic Carolina is open Monday through Saturday from 9:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m and Sundays from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
“They spent so long just building this business and just making it one of the many staples on Franklin Street,” said Chellani, “so it’s definitely going to stay in the family and it is something that I want to continue.”
Dhruva and Kris Chellani’s photo in Classic Carolina.
Photos via Classic Carolina
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