V&S continues with new owners of Stedman’s

Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com

GRAVENHURST — Curtis Humber was back on the job early Tuesday morning the day after his last official day as owner of Stedman’s V&S.

He was there before the new owners Ian and Tara McNaughton.

He was sitting at the front booth in the Copper Grill cafeteria with longtime employee Margaret Belleau, a 29-year employee.

It was just 8 a.m., when normally there would be more than a handful of locals sitting at nearby tables having morning coffee.

For many that’s a tradition.

But Tuesday, the store was closed for “inventory,” pink signs on the door stated.

A big job?

“No. You start on the left and go to the right. You write down the number of items on the shelf” — and mark it down on the piece of ledger paper tucked on the shelf.

The store reopens Wednesday, as usual, at 8 a.m.

Or as usual as it can after almost 32 years of ownership by one couple.

And Curtis will be there — to help load the pop machine out front.

“You need a roll of loonies and toonies and quarters,” he old Tara McNaughton.

“Everyone knows Curtis,” says Ian McNaughton, who bought the business with his wife.

“Curtis had been after me for a long time and when he told me it could become a discount store, I went home and talked if over again with Tara.”

That was August.

After a couple of meetings at the Humbers’ and one at the McNaughtons’, they struck a deal and there’s now a new couple running the junior department store.

And it will be business as usual.

The two couples went on a buying spree late this fall to all the same suppliers the Humbers have had for decades.

“And Curtis couldn’t stop buying,” Ian said good-naturedly, gesturing to his friend out on Gravenhurst’s main street, where customers kept coming and going from the front door, reassured the store would open Wednesday.

As usual.

There was a steady stream of customers and friends.

The same ones who have been coming for years — and who the McNaughtons are intent on keeping.

Stedman’s will continue to carry the wide variety of odds and sods.

Particularly the womenswear, the shoes and the yarn.

The Humbers really worked on those products, establishing exclusive lines.

Womenswear has always been a store leader, and in recent years they improved their shoe line and improved business.

And the yarn that’s the best in Canada has people driving from afar to buy it in bulk.

“It’s real yarn,” says Ian, “not the synthetic stuff from China.”

He says he and his wife plan to keep the same merchandise, including possibly a few household hardware items at the back.

They own the Home Hardware at the southend of town, and no sense eroding that business.

But they will add more shoes.

“The town’s business gap survey identified shoes” as a shopping priority for local residents.

But it’s still the Copper Grill that attracts customers, says Curtis, who started with Stedman’s in 1963 in his native Newfoundland.

While it only accounts for about 15 per cent of business, “They come in for the coffee or lunch and they may buy something.”

A lot of people started their day at Stedman’s or came in for lunch or their Christmas luncheons.

Many BIA and Rotary board meetings (some official, some not) were held in the Grill booths.

And the big basement was always full each fall for the Rotary TV/internet Auction. And the three days after the auction, customers lined up next to the tills to pick up their items.

That’s way the Humbers are, helping the town and business community.

It’s been a winning formula from Oct. 20, 1986 to Feb. 25, 2018.

And one they’ve seen through many ups and downs in almost 32 years in town, as the Muskoka Centre, Rubberset and Oliver McLeod’s — among many large and small businesses — have come and gone with their workers and customers.

Through the rise of Walmart and cars hitting the road to shops north and south, the Humbers have hung in and Curtis, always optimistic, said business kept growing.

The Humbers have been the tortoise in the hare race.

On their last official day Monday, customers were wishing them well.

But it was no big deal (thought they did receive a Rotary flash mob last Friday).

They knew the Humbers would still be around, helping and encouraging the McNaughtons.

And if you know Curtis (and who doesn’t), he’ll let them know what to do before they even ask him.

Business as usual, thank goodness.

Thank the McNaughtons.

They, too, are good community members who look forward to keeping the same “Value & Service.”