Shop talk
Walk into most neighborhood hardware stores and you’re likely to find the owner on the shop floor cutting keys, moving around pallets of merchandise or even offering plumbing advice to customers.
What you’ll also find is a long line of generations behind them that have kept the store operating, along with generations of loyal customers who have shopped there for decades.
“We’re all hardware stores, no matter how big or small,” says Doug Satterfield, co-owner of Rollier’s Hardware in Mt. Lebanon. “When you think of ‘mom and pop’ hardware stores, you think of the generations.”
Satterfield is a third-generation owner, along with his brothers Bob and Chuck, and continues to manage the shop floor at the Washington Road location they moved to more than two decades ago.
“We had to get bigger because our competition go bigger. There’s still that local feeling when you walk in you know who you’re talking to,” Satterfield says.
Rollier’s opened its doors in 1953 and has continued operating through four generations, with Satterfield’s two adults sons, Brett and Derek, launching an online component at www.hardtofinditems.com. The success and continuation of the business is predicated on the interest of that next generation, Satterfield says.
“The boys have done a really good job with that, and they deserve a lot of credit for it.”
The story is similar with other locally-owned hardware stores in the South Hills.
In 2008, Greg Gold and his brother, Chip, purchased Miller’s Hardware’s two locations in McMurray and Bethel Park. The Miller family operated it through four generations, beginning with the Bethel Park store in 1948 and the Peters Township location that opened 15 years later.
That name brought with it a loyal following, Gold says.
“It’s not an easy business. It’s always been challenging,” Gold says. “We like the challenge and feel we’re up for it. We have a lot of support from the community and a loyal customer base.”
Jason Sarasnick is the fourth generation to run Sarasnick’s Hardware on Washington Pike in the heart of Bridgeville’s business district. His great-grandfather, Joseph, opened the store at that location in 1938, and the business hasn’t stopped running since. Sarasnick has worked the store floor since he was in grade school and watched as generations of families continued to visit the store he runs with his father, Joseph Sarasnick III.
“I’ve seen, even when I was 11 or 12, the whole different realm of people that have changed,” Sarasnick says. “Their dads and grandpaps coming through. I’m waiting on the same people. Generation and generation that continues to patronize year after year. It’s an honor to serve the town.”
He works 70-hour weeks, often carrying pallets of building material out the backdoor to load into customers’ pickup trucks.
“You never run out of work in a hardware store,” Sarasnick says. “It’s nothing for the weak-minded or weak-hearted. There’s not a lot of vacation time.”
The arrival of a couple big box home improvement stores down the road a few years ago didn’t hurt business. In fact, Sarasnick says, it helped since they typically get three or four customers a day who call in looking for items they can’t find there.
“If they don’t have it or if they don’t want to get intertwined into it,” Sarasnick says.
Those teaching skills are what sets the neighborhood stores apart, says Andy Amrhein, who owns Evey Hardware on Route 88 in Bethel Park. Most of his full-time employees have been around for decades, so they can offer help on any project, Amrhein says.
“I think the days of people wanting price and price only, and giving up on knowledge is a thing of the past,” Amrhein says. “I think society is coming back to the belief that knowledge is worth something.”
He thinks the smaller stores are able to make adjustments to the customers’ needs faster than larger stores – “We’re not the big ship that can’t make a decision on one day.” – to offer better service that is personalized to their needs.
“They’re tired of the lack of service for it,” Amrhein says. “Our stores are able to adjust to what the neighborhood needs. It’s not a one-size-fits-all.”
The store has adjusted many times since Ed Evey opened its doors in 1953. Amrhein began working there in 1973, became a partner in the business seven years later and eventually became the sole owner in December 1994.
Through it all, he finds the most satisfaction when a customer completes a project on his or her own.
“I enjoy meeting people, talking to people and helping them. It’s a thrill to teach someone how to repair a piece of furniture,” Amrhein says. “Then they come back with a gleam in their eye that they did it themselves.”
Satterfield says that personalized “do-it-yourself” service can’t be found anywhere else. Walking someone through makes those long hours worth it, he says.
“You’re not a plumber by trade, but you’re a plumber today,” Satterfield says. “When they get that thing done in their house, it makes them smile.”
But all agree that giving back to the community – which in turn gives back to them – is most important.
“It’s being a long-standing part of the community,” Gold says. “We do a lot of community-related things to stay in the community and give back. I think folks have gotten used to us and a lot of people like supporting locally-owned businesses. All of our money gets re-circulated in the community.”
Satterfield says stores like theirs “know our purpose and position in the industry.” Most importantly, he says, they know their standing in the towns they serve.
“When you support local businesses,” he says, “they support the community.”