Shopsmith Forums

Ed in Tampa wrote:I'm older and I prefer to shop in a Hardware store. However I refuse to pay twice the price for the exact same product. Likewise I really appreciate being able to go to the parts bin but I refuse to play $1 for two 1/4" plain screws.

Being able to walk in and ask a clerk where the "this or that" is, is fantastic, but then having to pay 35% push up in price isn't.

My heart goes out to small mom and pop businesses that are pushed against the wall by the Big Boxes but my compassion only goes so far. If you want to compete cut the inventory you haven't sold in ten years and stock the inventory you can't keep on the shelf. I had one guy tell he couldn't keep something I was after on the shelf, so he stopped stocking it. Might have made sense to him but I was speechless.

When HD came to our area, we price shopped them. We found that to compete with them we needed to raise our prices. They lasted 3 years and closed 2 stores within 15 minutes from our store. When looking at the "exact same item" be sure to check the model #'s. Menards is good about having things made especially for them. They look the same but check the numbers and you'll mostly find that something has been left out. Selection is the area where hardware stores can't compete. You can only cram so much mdse in 4 walls.

[quote="burkhome"]When HD came to our area, we price shopped them. We found that to compete with them we needed to raise our prices. /QUOTE]

HUH????????????

I agree with something you said, many times the Big Boxes have a product made especially for them and it usually lacks something.

I think local hardware try too hard to have a "selection". I like hardware stores that stock one manufacture's product because in their opinion, of which they are very willing to share, is the best product for that use on the market. I have been pulled out more than one hole by a kindly one hardware expert that put his arm on my shoulder and said, "son why do you want to mess with that piece of junk when I got the best right here for the less money."

I think to many local hardware stores make the same mistake the big boxes do. It hurts them both but the big box is able to survive through more occurances. That problem is hiring someone that simply does not know and/or refusing to train them.

Not too many people will willing shop in a place where the sales people have no clue if gven a choice. And what is even worst than someone that doesn't know which end of a hammer to hold is the person that has no clue but will try to BS you into believing you have been holding hammers wrong all your life. They read on the internet steel handled hammers are best so they tell you, you should be holding the head and strike with the wooden handle. IDIOTS!

There are many hardware stores that operate like they don't care about their business. This is a fact or there wouldn't be so many going out of business. I have run hardware stores for several co-ops over the last 35 or so years. Since the advent of the "Box" Store, the co-ops will tell you that the Midwest probably the most price sensitive area in the US do to Menards and the various regional Farm stores. I personally would love to be sitting next door to HD or Lowes. Them I can compete with. Menards is much harder and Fleet Farm is near impossible. We are successful because we cater to our target customer totally. Currently, that customer is older because those are the people that appreciate service. We are noticing the internet is also beginning to cut into brick and mortar establishments.
All in all, things are changing very quickly in todays market place. We will continue to change according to our market. Hardware stores don't have the budgets of the Big Boxes but with commitment and creativity, I, at least hope they can survive.

As a family business (my wife and I and our 4 kids) we survived a lot of years when our peers were dropping like flies by providing carefully planned services and inventory. As an example we were "the" dominant vac shop in our community and we kept one of the widest ranges of disposable sweeper bag in the area. We stocked small quantities of bags for odd-ball vacs and old stuff that many of our customers still owned. A big store would have looked at the low turnover of those bags and dropped them from stock like a hot potato (possibly even throwing away what they had on hand) because the accountant knows best... Not so my friends... Word got around quickly that we were the "go to" place for hard to find items. Before we knew it our little store started getting a lot of out-of-county license plates. We didn't carry large numbers of the odd stuff, usually just 2 or 3 packages, but "having it" became our reputation. If we didn't have it we would get it. If a customer needed it we hunted it down and got it for them even if we lost a tiny bit up front due to erratic shipping and handling cost. We liked making money on every transaction but if you are not ready to eat a little cost in order to serve a customer once in a great while you should be working for somebody else. When we retired a great many of our customers were the grown children and grandchildren of our original customers and out customer base was "very" loyal.
Things did get pretty tough at different time over the years but we survived by being flexible and ready to change when change was needed. I often speak of a fellow merchant and good friend of mine who was very good at what he did and was highly trained at it. He also had good experience managing a similar store before he bought his. Things were fine as long as it all stayed stable but then things turned bad for downtown businesses all over Central Indiana. We made numerous changes to our operation including adding the shoe repair and some other rather drastic changes and we did fine. My good friend (now deceased) just hunkered down and kept doing everything the same way, doing it all exactly as he had been taught. He knew that he was doing it right and just couldn't adapt... He just sat there running that once very successful business the same way and rode it all the way to the bottom. He finally gave up when the power company and phone company both pulled the plug the same week...

Rambling again...


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robinson46176 wrote:As a family business (my wife and I and our 4 kids) we survived a lot of years when our peers were dropping like flies by providing carefully planned services and inventory. As an example we were "the" dominant vac shop in our community and we kept one of the widest ranges of disposable sweeper bag in the area. We stocked small quantities of bags for odd-ball vacs and old stuff that many of our customers still owned. A big store would have looked at the low turnover of those bags and dropped them from stock like a hot potato (possibly even throwing away what they had on hand) because the accountant knows best... Not so my friends... Word got around quickly that we were the "go to" place for hard to find items. Before we knew it our little store started getting a lot of out-of-county license plates. We didn't carry large numbers of the odd stuff, usually just 2 or 3 packages, but "having it" became our reputation. If we didn't have it we would get it. If a customer needed it we hunted it down and got it for them even if we lost a tiny bit up front due to erratic shipping and handling cost. We liked making money on every transaction but if you are not ready to eat a little cost in order to serve a customer once in a great while you should be working for somebody else. When we retired a great many of our customers were the grown children and grandchildren of our original customers and out customer base was "very" loyal.
Things did get pretty tough at different time over the years but we survived by being flexible and ready to change when change was needed. I often speak of a fellow merchant and good friend of mine who was very good at what he did and was highly trained at it. He also had good experience managing a similar store before he bought his. Things were fine as long as it all stayed stable but then things turned bad for downtown businesses all over Central Indiana. We made numerous changes to our operation including adding the shoe repair and some other rather drastic changes and we did fine. My good friend (now deceased) just hunkered down and kept doing everything the same way, doing it all exactly as he had been taught. He knew that he was doing it right and just couldn't adapt... He just sat there running that once very successful business the same way and rode it all the way to the bottom. He finally gave up when the power company and phone company both pulled the plug the same week...

Rambling again...


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The old addage applies...Insanity is "doing it the same way you always have done it and expecting different results"

burkhome wrote:The old addage applies...Insanity is "doing it the same way you always have done it and expecting different results"

Interestingly
My thoughts exactly!!!!!!

I have seen this exact scenario played out so many times.