If Cindi Edwards-Curry had a piece of advice for anyone it would be this: Don’t work for other people. Take the leap and start your own business, but also don’t believe you can do it on your own.

While she was working for someone else, she fortuitously gained knowledge about every aspect of managing a successful economic enterprise from invoicing to marketing to making the most of your personal traits.

Now, she runs three successful businesses in Helper Utah. They include the Balance Rock Eatery & Pub, the Happiness Within Coffee Shop, and the R & A Market and Deli. Her husband, Clay, and two daughters and a son, help make it a family affair in a family-centered town.

Helper is a quaint but growing community with about 2,000 residents 110 miles southeast of Salt Lake City and attracts locals and tourists headed to Moab or Grand Junction, Colorado.

It is a happy place, according to Curry. She has thrived and helped many others along the way. It is typical to see her planting flowers on Helper grounds to beautify the place or donating to the Catholic Church and town functions such as the August arts festival.

Ask some of the locals about her and these are some things you’ll hear: She’s caring, irreplaceable, invaluable, amazing and family oriented.

Joan Burgess, Helper’s deputy city recorder, might be a little biased but how she came to be reunited with Cindi. She was dining at the Balance Rock Eatery and heard Cindi speaking of a man named Ed Edwards (Cindi’s grandfather). That’s when they realized they were cousins and had met years prior when they were young girls. “She’s just so creative in her businesses and her buildings,” Burgess said. “And then she brought all her kids with her, and I’ve gotten to know them well too.”

City Recorder Jona Skerl said the town wouldn’t be the same without Cindi. “She is quite the entrepreneur. She has such great talent and is a super nice person.” Both women agree she deserves some time for herself, possibly a spa-day gift certificate.

Cindi may take a break, but she will not be leaving her work anytime soon. “My family is the reason I do this,” she said. “I can leave them a life and a community.”

Balance Rock Eatery
148 S Main Street
Helper, Utah 84526
435-472-0403