To say Jessica Case has a history of varied interests would be an understatement. From science to journalism, preservation law to the music industry, Case's interests have run a wide gamut of affection since her freshman year in college, when the Virginia native entered the University of Kentucky to study biology. After writing for the Kentucky Kernel, UK's school newspaper, Case switched her major to journalism. And though she ended up following a different path altogether after college, she did experience some formative encounters during those undergrad years, including meeting Clark Case, an editor for the Kernel (who would eventually become both her husband and business partner), and falling in love with Buster's, a downtown bar that she would eventually come to own, relocate and expand.
Like many young graduates, Case finished her undergraduate career without having determined exactly what she wanted to pursue. Her then-fiancĂ Clark Case was studying for the LSAT, so Case studied alongside him and ended up deciding to go to law school. After their first year, the couple spent virtually all of the money they had earned working for law firms that summer on their wedding.
"We always laugh about how we should have put signs up that said, 'This wedding brought to you by (local law firms) Stites & Harbison and Dinsmore & Shohl,'" Jessica Case joked. After working for Dinsmore & Shohl for a stint, she left to pursue what she calls "an outside-the-box" career path. After spending a number of months traveling Europe and the Caribbean, an experience that gave the couple plenty of time to think about their next step, the Cases decided together that they wanted to pursue an entrepreneurial path.
"It's hard for women in law, especially when you're looking down the road at how you're going to juggle a family and your career," Case said. "I have seen so many women struggling with that - having kids, going down to part-time and losing their ability to get a partnership. I wanted a career that would be more flexible, so I wouldn't have to make some of those tough decisions that they were making. I wanted to do it on my own terms."
The couple soon started their own law firm, Case & Case, which operates out of their downtown home and specializes in small-business needs. (Jessica refers to the firm as a "business services boutique.") Since then, Case's path has led her to a milestone in an entirely different direction, one that she considers her biggest accomplishment: operating Buster's Billiards & Backroom, Lexington's only mid-sized music venue, located in the Distillery District, Lexington's emerging arts and entertainment district.
The momentum started with a love for Buster's, a bar she and Clark frequented in their college days, and an interest in preservation law. (Case is on the board of the Blue Grass Trust for Historic Preservation and has served as a volunteer for Preserve Lexington, speaking on their behalf in the months after the controversial downtown Lexington CentrePointe project was announced.) After it was determined that, despite the efforts of Preserve Lexington and other community groups who opposed the project, the historic building that Buster's was located in was to be razed for a new downtown development, the Cases took matters in their own hands, purchasing Buster's and making plans to relocate it. It just so happened that the space that stood out to them - an 11,000-square-foot former distillery warehouse - was more than three times the size of the original bar. The plan then morphed into a proposal to expand the bar to include a 1,000-capacity music venue, the only one of its size in Lexington.
The new Buster's opened in September in its new Manchester Street location, serving as a functioning symbol of what is envisioned in the district. The negotiation skills the couple have honed with their litigation practice have definitely carried over, Case said, as booking bands is all negotiation.
At times, the venture has been trying. The economy has put many of the area's other proposed projects on hold, and the hours are incredibly long, even for a lawyer.
"We work until 4 or 5 a.m.," Case admitted, adding that Case & Case simply doesn't have the time to take on new cases right now. She said she hopes to return focus to the law firm after the initial kinks of the new club are ironed out. But with only seven months of operation under its belt, the venue has hosted a number of packed-house concerts so far, as well as a number of benefit events for local community groups.
"Donating our venue for community functions helps us accomplish a goal that was inherent in our desire to reopen Buster's in the form of a mid-size music venue: to help make Lexington as a whole a stronger, more vibrant community through arts, preservation, education, and community activism," Case said.