HOME HARDWARE MOVING INTO OLD STEDMANS, WHICH IS GETTING ITS OWN STORE

Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com

GRAVENHURST — The downtown is about to undergo further great new changes.

Ian and Tara McNaughton, owner-operators of Gravenhurst Home Hardware and Stedmans V&S Department Store, today announced plans for two new stores.

The hardware will move into an expanded and renovated Stedmans building; and they will open a new separate store for “fashion, footwear and yarn” elsewhere in downtown permanently in the fall under a new name.

The Stedmans store will close and some of its other hard goods will be rolled into the hardware, which is also taking over the Elephant’s Trunk next door.

In June they will begin renovations on the two buildings.

Then next February they will move the Home Hardware uptown, with some exciting new additions.

“Wait till you see the new design, it’s really going to be something — a real Muskoka look,” Ian said in reference to the new hardware building and Elephant’s Trunk

It’s will “boost the revitalization of Gravenhurst’s downtown core with the relocation and expansion of their businesses,” he says.

Especially the revitalizing north end of the main street where three other new businesses are about to open, including the Brick and the Relish Cafe across the street.

“We’ve already had the engineers in,” he said of the new hardware location, which will open a new set of stairs just in the front door to allow shoppers to find more goods downstairs.

The Stedmans store, which Tara has run since they bought it along with Ken Schwabb’s Elephant’s Trunk next door at the end of February 2018, is 12,000 square feet on the ground floor and 11,000 square feet downstairs.

The Elephant’s Trunk second hand store, which Schwab is moving a few doors down to the old law office, is 5,500 square feet.

An inside door will connect those two adjacent buildings to allow hardware customers to walk between them.

McNaughton said it will more than double the 12,000 square feet of space Home Hardware currently occupies at the south end plaza.

In total the new combined store will be 28,500 square feet.

It’s all part of an “exciting and scary” investment in Gravenhurst’s downtown for the couple who came to town nine years ago, said McNaughton, who also owns the Home Hardware in Parry Sound.

“Even though our new Home Hardware space will be almost double the size of the current location, we’re going to deliver back that small-town hometown hardware store experience,” McNaughton says.

“It’s going to feel like the cozy downtown hardware store you probably remember from when you were a kid.

“Like the one Lionel Carter ran” where the Elephant’s Trunk was back in the 1970s era.

The Home Hardware will include, some but not all, items of the existing Stedmans, including toys, giftware, stationery, hardware, house wares, cleaning, and greeting cards, says a release Thursday.

The large outdoor garden centre won’t be moving.

Tara’s new store will concentrate on fashion, footwear and yarn, which has been the store’s mainstays in recent years. The other parts of the Stedman’s business had been waning, Ian said.

Those three departments will be enlarged to “form an exciting new store located on the main street” and is scheduled to open in autumn of this year at an as yet to be leased location elsewhere in the downtown.

Meanwhile at the hardware, Ian says: “With the additional retail footage, the plan is to add comprehensive elements such as a full outdoor-living & barbecue department and a complete ‘Make your Dream Bathroom come true’ bath shop, where customers can find everything from tubs, fixtures and fittings to towels and décor.”

The release says the move bucks the trend of the past two decades, during which retailers across Canada have fled the historical cores of small municipalities to establish big box stores on the outskirts of town.

“We couldn’t be more excited to welcome Home Hardware to their new location in Historic Downtown Gravenhurst. The additional traffic to their popular location will help enhance and revitalize the north end of town,” says Dave Campbell, the Gravenhurst BIA chair.

“I am so excited for the new, bigger space,” says Kendra Weisflock, store manager of the Gravenhurst Home Hardware. “We are going to be able to offer more products, more experience and serve our customers even better than we do today! The new Indoor BBQ Kitchen Experience Centre will be truly one-of-a-kind in the area.”

Long-time Stedmans manager, Margaret Belleau, will continue to run the new store, focusing in on and enhancing its core product lines to improve the retail experience even further for customers.

The reorganization and relocation have an added benefit: improved parking, which was part of the reason for relocating the hardware business.

“I was always getting complaints about that,” he said.

“In our current location, we often field concerns from customers who find it difficult to safely turn left onto Muskoka Road, or who object to the speed of some drivers crossing our shared lot.”

The new Home Hardware location will sit beside a full parking lot where the McNaughtons expect there to be at least 40 parking spaces available to customers even during peak hours.

There are 14 spots on the north side of the building, and dozens more on Muskoka Road and Brown Street beside it and across the street along Church Street.

The plan is to operate both businesses as usual this summer and begin the transition after Labour Day, with a move to the temporary Stedmans after that.

Then renovations begin on the two buildings in the fall, with plans for a soft opening in February and to be fully operational by spring.

Ian McNaughton says the moves have an added benefit of creating a friendlier, down hometown feel, where customers can easily pop into the hardware, shop and be out without going to the south end.

It’s convenient for walk-in traffic and people who don’t drive either, but still want the same hardware products.

He calls the building a “landmark” in Gravenhurst, which the former owners Curt and Irene Humber helped create with their decades-long business.

“It’s a big step,” said Ian, but one that the Humbers encouraged and are still helping with advice.

But, with the Stedmans corporation gone as of 1997, and the maybe only a handful of stores in name only surviving also as independents (including Bancroft and the Soo), its brand days as a general five-and-dime convenience store are gone.

McNaughton said, frankly, he has run out of space where he leases now and that they have tried in recent years to do something about that with their landlord, to no avail.

A sign at the plaza says it is for sale.

And with McDonald’s (also finishing up renovations this spring) and Giant Tiger customers, buses and other commuters eating up space in the large-looking parking lot, often Home Hardware customers were left with less than a dozen usable spots they could count on to park and run in and out.

“It’s super exciting and super scary,” said Ian, adding it’s an investment in the downtown that will allow them to “offer so much more, with customer service” and things like barbecue cooking classes.

“It’s a leap in faith.”

He said “retail is not like it was 20 years ago. It’s about the experience (of shopping). It’s no longer just putting a price on something and selling it.”

The McNaughtons don’t want that big box feel with row upon row of goods.

All of Home Hardware’s valued employees will be coming along to the new location, and with expanded service and expanded size, and the McNaughtons say they will be looking to grow the team as well.

Interested applicants are encouraged to drop by Home Hardware’s current location to pick up an application form.

The McNaughtons hope the new stores will become another important part of the larger revitalization of Gravenhurst, adding to the attractions already energizing the north section of the downtown.

“We want to congratulate Ian & Tara McNaughton on their relocation and expansion into Gravenhurst’s downtown,” says Paul Kelly, Mayor of Gravenhurst, in the release. “Investments, like the one announced today, continue to support council’s priority to revitalize Gravenhurst’s downtown core and to support businesses in building economic and employment opportunities. We are happy that this expansion will fill gaps identified in our recent retail gap analysis as well as serve as another anchor tenant for our business community to band around. It is incredibly important to us that Gravenhurst continues to support our existing businesses and work to attract new investment.”

In the meantime, the McNaughtons hope their loyal customers will remain patient as they prepare for a better, more personal business and shopping experience.