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Hensel’s Ace Hardware has taken an unusual approach to store layout, and owning two buildings in the heart of their city makes that possible.
As the Arcata, California, business has grown, it has steadily moved into more of the town’s large historic building, named Seely & Titlow. And within the past five years, the multistore shopping area has turned into a complex of Hensel businesses, as other tenants have left.
Hensel’s Ace Hardware runs businesses out of two separate buildings, roughly 6,500 square feet each, on a prime piece of downtown Arcata real estate. Earlier this year, the company took over the property when the last renter moved out.
Management at Hensel’s Ace Hardware used the opportunity to fully occupy both buildings to make changes to further distinguish the business.
“Our project was a complete revamp of the property, product selection and flow of the parking lot, buildings and store,” says Ceva Courtemanche, president of Hensel’s Ace Hardware Inc. and past NRHA Young Retailer of the Year honoree. “Our property went from OK to being amazing.”
The newly taken over building is now painted to match the original building, which houses the main hardware store. The company did outdoor landscaping and decorated both buildings with old-fashioned photos of the town and Arcata’s plaza, bringing some of the town’s history to light.
The hardware business continues to run out of the main building, which offers many of the main hardware categories, as well as specialty services like screen repair, knife sharpening and pipe threading. The second, newly taken-over building is home to several separate stores: paint, kitchen, appliances, cleaning supplies and old-fashioned candy. Each store is set up as if it stands alone, but customers can walk freely through the entire building, access stores through any of three entrances and pay for purchases at all four registers.
The kitchen store offers a broad canning selection and a variety of bottles and containers for customers who make their own balms, oils, candles and gifts. As for the candy store, Courtemanche describes it as “one of a kind.” Its interior design includes black and white checkered floors with vibrant colors striping the walls. This store is a destination for shoppers because it offers unusual candies from Germany, Britain, Mexico, Sweden and Japan, in addition to your everyday U.S. candy selections.
Customers have responded positively to the store layouts and product selection, according to Courtemanche.
“We moved paint into the hardware store five years ago knowing it’d eventually be moved into its own space,” Courtemanche says. “Customers and contractors love that it’s out of the hardware store and on its own.”
To celebrate the company’s recent expansion, Courtemanche hosted a grand re-opening event attended by the store’s top customers, contractors who worked on the project, friends and family and home improvement industry experts, such as representatives from Ace Hardware Corp. and NRHA. Check out this photo gallery on Facebook to see images from the event.
