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Vintage Finds Add Character to Checkout Counter

Walk into Dan’s Ace Hardware, in Idaho Falls, Idaho, and you will be greeted with vintage charm.

The new store, which opened the first week of March, was a new build and the perfect opportunity for Daniel Moldenhauer, co-owner of five stores with his brothers, to add some character to the new store.

Moldenhauer says he and his team got a lot of ideas from Pinterest for the design of the store.

“There’s a lot of cool things you can find on Pinterest that you can apply to your store,” he says. “Many customers go to Pinterest to look up fun ideas to improve their home. We thought, why couldn’t we do the same for our store?”

Besides the bright, colorful signage used throughout the interior, Dan’s Ace Hardware also incorporates vintage and rustic elements such as wood paneling, Edison light bulbs, mason jar lights and a unique display behind the checkout counter. The checkout counter, which sits next to an old-school Coca-Cola machine, has a backdrop that includes a vintage Ace Hardware neon sign and a collection of Ace Hardware model cars and airplanes.

“My brother bought the hardware sign on Ebay,” Moldenhauer says. “The only thing we had to change was redoing the neon.”

The company that sold Moldenhauer the sign from is located in Chicago and its mission is to acquire old things and resell them.

The old school cars, which are housed on a display made from lumber and galvanized pipe, all have Ace Hardware logos on them.

“Ace partners with a vendor to make these cars and they have been making them for years,” he says. “We just bought about 6-7 2016 models and currently have at least 50-60 of the other models.”

The sign, old wood, model cars and retro Coca-Cola machine all revolve around the theme of “heritage”, according to Moldenhauer.

“We wanted to show off the heritage that Ace Hardware had since their heritage is long and deep,” he says. “Everything revolves around that.”

More pictures of the store can be seen in the gallery below or you can visit Dan’s Ace Hardware’s Facebook page.

 

About Sara Logel

As NRHA’s market research analyst, Sara conducts organic research and stays abreast of industry trends to help hardware retailers better run their business. Sara also contributes to editorial content in Hardware Retailing magazine. Sara received her B.S. in Marketing and Spanish from Butler University and, after graduation, began her career with NRHA. Sara enjoys traveling, being outdoors and exploring the city of Indianapolis.

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