Operations

Since California and New York approved minimum wage increases this month, minimum wage is fresh on business owners’ minds. But increases–even up to a $15 base wage–aren’t cause for intense anxiety, says Gina Schaefer, who owns A Few Cool Hardware Stores’ 11 locations in Washington, D.C., …

Getting more young people interested in a career in hardware retailing is critical to the future of the industry. And for Luke Wiesen, general manager at Millard Lumber’s Spring Hill, Kansas, location, it’s equally important to get students interested in …

On April 22, people will celebrate Earth Day in unique ways, and independent home improvement stores are getting in on the action. Many businesses are hosting events or raising awareness around the holiday in other ways, but several stores have Earth care as part …

Each year for the past 99 years, the North American Retail Hardware Association (NRHA) has conducted the Cost of Doing Business Study, the industry’s only inclusive retail benchmarking study. This study is extremely important and beneficial to a home improvement retailer …

All leaders have at least one thing in common – they’ve all made major mistakes somewhere along the way. Take it from Dave Ramsey, author, motivational speaker, TV personality and radio host. “We screwed up, that screw up brought us pain, …

It’s a tricky balance. You want to extend a line of credit to your contractor and commercial customers, but you also need to get paid. When they’re slow to pay, how do you get your money without making your customer …

As a small business owner, you may be well acquainted with the owners of your neighboring businesses, but if you want to open more of a dialogue in your business community, a social networking site is here to help. It’s called Alignable. Alignable is a free …

So you’ve decided to build, or update, your company’s website. That’s a smart move—in a world where technology is ever-increasing, it’s important for retailers to use that technology to reach their audience. Whether you’re making your website simple and to …