In Praise of the Local Hardware Store
It was a simple need, eight Philips head inch-long wood screws with a quarter inch diameter, but it proved beyond the capability of a $50 billion hardware store.
The Wife had purchased a Boos Block table with a metal base online. The purchase came in separate shipments with no instructions, templates or fasteners to put the two together. I thought this was a mistake and called the Boos Block company. They directed me to the online merchant who explained since they sold tables and bases that could be mixed and matched, they couldn’t provide hardware or templates to cover all possibilities. That seemed a bit of a stretch for your average homeowner willing to spend $600 on a 36 inch round of wood, but the customer service rep explained that the people buying these tables knew how and had the hardware to install them.
I laid the table top upside down on the floor and within an hour had measured and drawn a template that centered the cross-legged base with an X-shaped spider onto the wooden bottom. I then took measurements of the wood and spider’s thickness, and determined that I needed inch long wooden screws. The spider used up a quarter inch of that length and the table was 1.5 inches thick so the screws would embed half-way through the top. I checked my inventory and of course had no screws matching the need, so I stopped at the big box “home” store to find the screws while running errands in the area.
The older I get the less of a fan I become of these large stores. They are geared towards meeting the needs of the average home owner, selling low quality low priced items sourced from China. The moment you stray from the this formula you’re out of luck. Evidently as I age I’m becoming less average because I find myself either walking out of the stores without finding what I need or making compromises and buying what I don’t want with increasing frequency. Yesterday was no different.
The average store size of this retailer is 116,000 square feet. Of that they devote approximately 40 linear feet to screws. This may seem a lot until you realize how many types of screws there are. Wood screws. Sheet metal screws. Philips head, flat. Carriage bolts. Metric and imperial. Because I had carefully measured the table and its base I knew exactly what I needed, but the amount of space devoted to wood screws was just a fraction of that 40 linear feet so it quickly became clear that I wasn’t going to find what I was looking for. A store associate saw my dismay and tried to help, but all he could offer was inch long wood screws with bolt heads. I hadn’t measured for the clearance a bolt head requires, but I bought the screws anyway hoping they’d work. It was another compromise purchase and like so may others I’ve made at the store it failed; none of the ratchets that fit the bolt would fit into the base’s holes. So I chucked the screws into a screw drawer and cursed my stupidity for compromising again.
This morning before work I stopped by the local hardware store, a family run operation with only a fraction of the big box’s square footage. The proprietor greeted me as soon as I walked through the door and I told him what I wanted. He walked me over to the screw section which took up a large portion of the center of the store, and found exactly what I needed. I was in and out within two minutes and $1.20 poorer but wealthier with the right screw for the job. Oh, and the screws were cheaper than the compromise ones I bought from the big box retailer.
For years I have been seduced by the size and supposed selection of the big box stores but no more. Every time a project has ground to a halt over a missing part or a broken Chinese-made tool the local hardware stores have been there for me, somehow managing to have exactly what I need in their tiny, crammed-to-the-rafters spaces. I’ll admit I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit this now at such a late age; I should have known better years ago. But as the Wife says, there’s no time like the present to stop being stupid, and like most of what she says, she’s right.
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