From Staff Reports

The jewelry store billboard in Asheville that sparked mostly negative reaction around the nation was replaced April 4 with a message that thanks the supporters of a downtown jewelry store.

The billboard now says, “Asheville rocks,” with the “o” in the form of a sparkling diamond.

“We are sorry if we offended anybody, we did have thousands more supporters than we have people who were offended so we wanted to thank our supporters,” Eva-Michelle Spicer, co-owner of Spicer Greene Jewelers, told the Asheville Citizen-Times.

She the AC-T that the new message “thanks all of Asheville and it’s another play on words, further demonstrating the first one was a play on words.”

Spicer Greene Jewelers triggered criticism in March for a billboard that said, “Sometimes, it’s OK to throw rocks at girls....” The billboard, off Patton Avenue near Interstate 240, featured the “rocks” — against a white backdrop — as red, blue, yellow, green, pink and silver gemstones, orbiting around big, black letters.