Pick & Shovel Doit Best Building Materials

 

Store Name Pick & Shovel Doit Best Building Materials
Expanding product line to meet local demands.Business Type Building Material and Lawn and Garden

NAICS Code 444

Location 54 Coventry, Newport, VT 5855

Nearby Businesses

Owner/Manager Greg Hamlett

Special Store Activities

Year Opened 1976

Website http://www.pickandshovel.doitbest.com/

Phone 802-334-8370

E-mail pick.shovel@comcast.net

Community Profile Newport, VT Community Profile: Population of City – 5,000. Population of 10-mile ring 16,000. The community serves a local residential base as well as seasonal tourism visitors to the Northeast Kingdom region of Vermont. Significant downtown redevelopment efforts have occurred such as the construction of a state office building and a major waterfront project that allows downtown visitors access to beautiful Lake Memphremagog.

Products Sold & Niche Developed

From the outside, the business appears much like a regular hardware store. Once in the door, you are greeted by helpful and friendly staff dressed in red shirts and eager to direct you to departments that provide day-to-day necessities often lacking in a small town. In addition to a full stocked hardware store, Pick and Shovel includes a building materials center, appliance store, clothing, sporting goods, toys, pet store, laundromat, and more. In response to resident requests, the store offers a wide selection of socks, jeans, boots, shirts and other apparel items. In addition, they have focused on many quality items such as Carhart boots and offer very competitive pricing. A stop in the store isn’t complete without stopping for a soft serve cone at the ice cream stand located on the street as a landmark feature of the storefront.

Market Segments Served

Pick & Shovel focuses primarily on serving do-it-yourself home improvement customers. As a result, it focuses on the residential base as well as second-home owners in the region. Accordingly, its diversified product lines have a community-serving focus.

Contributions to the Business Community

The community-serving focus of the store has established it as an anchor business downtown. Its location across the street from the post office and a block from the library has contributed to a diversified main street with jewelry, clothing, gift, sporting goods and other locally owned stores. While Pick & Shovel is bracing for the potential opening of the first Wal-Mart in the region, their diversification efforts will help it co-exist as a truly home-town business that has been a genuinely good, community-serving neighbor.