For my assignment I went to several hardware stores in my neighborhood, but this one stood out the most to me in efficiency.
The Hardware store’s address is 1137 Jamaica Ave, Richmond Hill, NY 11418.
The store doesn’t stick out like a sore thumb, but if you fix things, you probably know about the place anyways. I casually bumped into this place because I needed to make some copies of my work keys, and they just so happen to also make copies of keys. As the lady at the desk worked on my keys, I took the opportunity to look around.
I was surprised as to how many hand tools they had on the entire left wall as I walked in, but a little underwhelmed with how small the actual store looked. If you wanted simple hand tools that required no electricity or external power, practically everything was there. I asked a store assistant if they sold any power tools, and they said I’d have to ask them at the counter for it and they’d fetch them for me out of a large storage cabinet. They had a huge selection of power tools and the inside of that cabinet was insane.
They had an assortment of painting supplies like rollers, chisels, masking tape and joint compound. They didn’t have an assortment of lumber, but they made up for it in the huge assortment of interior/wood paints. The store suddenly seemed much bigger.
Hi, that’s me inside the store. →
They had an entire area with different sized ladders. The largest ladder they had was a fiberglass 20′ ladder.
They had a huge assortment of steel and PVC pipes, all neatly separated. Among that, were plenty of industrial fasteners, sold in bulk or loosely at a few cents each. Pretty neat for when you don’t need 300 1-1/2″ screws to put together a nightstand. The employees knew exactly where everything was off the top of their head, which was extremely helpful and impressive. In the next few aisles, there were electrical home tools like LEDs, soldering guns, welding supplies, helmets, and wire, but they were working on inventory in the aisles, so I couldn’t get a good photo of it.
Even for the home improvement novice or the backyard builder, this store is ideal and easily accessible in its aisles. Everything is cluttered, but it is all organized accordingly. For the few of us with common sense, the job gets easier, as the paints are with the brushes and the tape measures are with the hand tools, and the keychains are with the squishy neon key covers.
I’d give the place an A for efficiency and variety, but they don’t carry ply stretchers OR glass hammers, so I’m going to have to give it an A-.
(In actuality, it gets an A- because had they stocked ANY type of lumber, the store would be sheer perfection.)
