The Blog

     One of the given axioms in advertizing is that everyone loves animals. I get a Hardware Industry magazine at work and many of the hardware entrepreneurs they write about have store mascots (mostly dogs or cats) that are prominently featured in their advertizing. I’ve never written about them before, but we certainly have

     I could not post anything last Saturday because I was busy at the biggest event on my social calender (after my wife’s birthday and our wedding anniversary of course!), this year’s Historical Engine Society’s Antique Power Show. For those of you who are not familiar with the concept of a power show, it

     A few weeks ago I ranted and raved about keys, this week it’s telephones. Our main phone line went out this week and that’s what got me started. I remember an old comedy record (that’s right, an LP) that I listened to years ago that said something to the effect that while there were

     This might be a little different for the Hardware Store blog, but believe me, there is a connection. Our hardware store is a member of the Burton Chamber of Commerce, who are a great bunch of folks, local merchants and business owners who have joined together to help promote the good life here in

    Last week, as you may recall, I was complaining about all the rain. Well, it’s still raining and all that water has to go somewhere. I spent part of yesterday trying to get my Mom’s garage drains flowing again, so I thought that it might be good to talk about storm drains around the

   The old saying about the weather is that everybody complains about it, but nobody does anything. Well, if I could do something I’d stop the rain. Although it is sunny out right now, it did rain this morning and it seems like most of the last month. Oh, I know we need rain for

   When we went to decorate the store window this week, my wife came up with the idea of putting some of our “tinware” on display. I thought it was a great idea as it is one of the more unique products that we offer at the store. I love tinware and I’ve always preferred

    The other day my wife told me that I had a surprise coming up soon but she wouldn’t tell me what it was. Imagine my surprise when into the store walked an old friend from when I was growing up. It was Jeff Jones, who lived across the street from me when I was

  One thing that I can count on selling at the store in the Summer are garden hoses and supplies. When I think of garden hoses, I usually think of sprinklers, sometimes it seems like I spent my entire youth running through sprinklers in the Summer. You see, we didn’t have air conditioning when I

    It’s official, I’m tired of sorting keys! Which strikes me as sort of odd, as I actually like locks and keys. It’s something about how the right key fits precisely into the lock, and if it’s cut just right the precision pins in the lock line up just right and it opens – its