Local Charity to Receive Profits from New Store

In April, Private Gallery, based in Fair Hope, Ala., opened a store on Dickson Street in Fayetteville to provide 100 percent of its profit to Quality Life Association Inc.

Private Gallery is a clothing, jewelry and accessories store, said Denise Knox, owner of the company. There are 13 stores located in Alabama, Georgia, Florida and Arkansas. Knox is the niece of Quality Life founders Jack and Lynne Alexander of Mulberry.

The Alexanders started Quality Life Associates in Fayetteville in 2000 to provide assistance to people with traumatic brain injuries and neurological diseases. In 1984, their daughter, Kathy, suffered traumatic brain injuries from a car accident, leaving her dependent on assistance.

Lynne Alexander, chairman and CEO of the company, developed the nonprofit organization because she couldn’t find any programs in the area that focused on individuals with traumatic brain injuries.

Knox, looking for a charity for her business to contribute to, chose Quality Life because she wanted to help Kathy Alexander, her cousin.

“She’s just a few years younger than me, and we were very close when we were growing up,” Knox said of Kathy Alexander. “When [the car accident] happened, it really had an impact on my life.”

All of Knox’s stores will sell paintings by individuals in the Quality Life program, and all of the proceeds will go to the charity.

In 2000, the Alexanders opened a women’s center on Gregg Avenue in Fayetteville. Kathy currently lives at the women’s center.

Site work has begun on a 54-unit apartment complex at the Village on Skull Creek, a 6.4-acre site on Gregg Avenue next to the women’s unit, Lynne Alexander said. There are also plans for a 5,866-SF center on the site, which will house Quality Life offices.

For the 2004 tax year (the most recent numbers available through public records), Quality Life Associates had $283,166 in revenue, but expenses, including program services, were $376,378.