Walter Printing Company recently bought Standard Office. Walter Printing officially took ownership Dec. 31, 2018.

“I’ll be 70 years old in April and I’ve been in the office business for 38 years and so I figured it’s time to retire,” said Debbie Biggers, now former owner of Standard Office.

Standard Office has been an institution in Albemarle. Originally called the Standard Office Equipment Company Inc., it was founded in 1947 by Biggers’ father-in-law, Wallace Biggers, and his partner, Harvey Garrison.

The store originally sold business machines like manual typewriters, Biggers said.

“Over the years it evolved into more office supplies and furniture as opposed to business machines,” she said.

Once Wallace Biggers and Harvey Garrison retired in the 1970s, Debbie’s husband, Stan, ran the store until his death in 2001. Debbie had been running the store since.

She said Standard Office always had a close working relationship with Walter Printing, which was founded in 1957 by brothers Don and Charlie Walter. Walter Printing would often purchase its office supplies from Standard Office.

“It’s been a great relationship over the years,” said Tim Walter, who along with his brother Mark own Walter Printing. “We thought their customer service was pretty much the same as ours and we thought it’d be a good fit to run it together.”

Tim added that printing and office supplies go hand-in-hand for many businesses.

Once Walter knew Biggers was going to retire it was a perfect opportunity to keep Standard Office alive.

“I didn’t want to see it go out of business,” said Tim.

Some of Standard Office’s employees are now working with Walter Printing and Biggers will continue to work until the Walters brothers feel comfortable running the office supply store.

“Their service was so good, we just want to continue it and try to make it better,” said Tim.