Lexington, KY - Since 1937, an independent hardware store on High Street has provided nearby residents with a wide-reaching variety of supplies for their yards, doors, bathrooms and more. Bill Edwards and his wife bought the store almost a decade ago, and have been working hard to perfect the 20,000-plus item inventory, in order to ensure that shoppers can access all their hardware needs in one, locally-owned stop.
"We want to make sure that we have everything we possibly can to keep people from having to go anywhere else," Edwards added.
In addition to the essential nuts and bolts, the inventory currently includes a surprising number of cleaning supplies, shower curtain liners, welcome mats, mason jars and charcoal grills. You'll find fully assembled wheelbarrows, garden clogs, toilet paper, yard sale signs - even dog bones. Some items that my household in particular has recently procured from Chevy Chase Hardware include an old-fashioned push mower, reflective tape, cedar mulch and a simple wire mesh drain catch (which Lowe's doesn't carry). "I'll guarantee we sell more silver polish than anyone in town," Edwards said.
The store is one of the only local retail outlets licensed to sell Porter Paint, and in addition to a variety of packaged seeds, they stock a number of seedlings and small plants in the early spring - all organic and purchased locally from Proper Plants on Military Pike.
Chevy Chase Hardware doesn't stop with the products. Services offered include repairing lamps, storm windows, screens and doors, as well as making keys, sharpening knives, scissors and tools, and putting the ends on hoses. The store, which has a sizeable shop in the back that many customers may not know about, has historically been equipped to repair small engines. While the shop is currently looking to replace their engine maintenance worker, who fell ill this year, they can still accommodate a number of smaller engine jobs.
As for how this anomaly of a shop has managed to stay afloat for more than 70 years, amidst a sea of economic downturns (not just this one) and burgeoning 500,00 -plus square foot home improvement centers, Edwards says the key is in variety of inventory, sincere and outstanding service, and the neighborhood itself.
"A lot of it is Chevy Chase - the fact that it is pretty well-protected," said Edwards, who first opened Lexington Hardware Store on Richmond Road in 1975. (The store went out of business shortly after two "big box" hardware chains opened on that same road within six months of each other, almost 10 years ago.) "It's a unique neighborhood, and everyone wants to stay right here."
"I'm pretty sure if they could put a [big box hardware store] on stilts and cram it in here, they would," Edwards added with a chuckle. That may be true, but until that day comes, Chevy Chase Hardware has got the market cornered in this neighborhood - and deservedly so.