What just might be the best-kept secret in DIY home restoration is coming to Aurora. Finally.
“Part of the reason why we came out to Aurora is that we didn’t really see anything like this out here,” said Ryan Smith, chief retail officer of Habitat for Humanity of Metro Denver. “At least a couple times a week at our call center, we’ll get people who say, ‘when are you going to come to Aurora? Why do I have to drive all the way to Denver or Littleton or Wheat Ridge to see one of your stores?’ And we listen to our customers, so here we are.”
Smith and his team are currently putting the final touches on Habitat for Humanity of Metro Denver’s newest ReStore on Abilene Street in central Aurora. The organization’s fourth such outlet in the metro area — the three others are spread across Denver, Wheat Ridge and Littleton — Aurora’s ReStore will sell and accept donations of tools, appliances, furniture, hardware, cabinetry, and just about any other imaginable item that may be needed in the build-out or renovation of a home.
“Basically, it’s a resource for the community,” said Robyn Burns, spokeswoman for Habitat of Metro Denver. “We will be serving low-income and really income-range-across-the-board people who are looking for low-cost alternatives for home building and home renovation.”
With a total of about 850 located across the country, ReStores have been around for nearly a decade and their sales account for approximately 30 percent of Habitat’s annual fundraising efforts, according to Smith. He said that Habitat’s four metro area stores pump out a sales volume higher than any other market in the country, and that the region’s 33,000-square-foot flagship store, located just off of West Ellsworth Avenue in Denver, is the nation’s sixth most productive ReStore outlet.
Aurora’s Restore is currently only 9,000 square feet, though a 5,000-square-foot expansion project is already underway and expected to be completed by August. The store opens for initial sales and donations on Feb. 2.
Habitat of Metro Denver has sought to open a ReStore in Aurora for years, according to Smith, who identified the location on Abilene St. as an ideal one to target both donors and customers.
“When we look at the demographic profiles of who our customers are and who our donors are, what we see is that those are slightly different, but what we see here (in Aurora) is what I like to call the ‘Goldilocks zone,’” he said.
Smith explained that with a traditionally higher-income demographic to the south of the new store and a slightly lower-income population to the north, it allows the shop on Abilene St. to be a central point that both donors and purchase-minded customers can easily access.
“It’s just warm enough,” he said.
Outside of that tepid retail area, Habitat of Metro Denver has constructed several homes in Aurora over its nearly 40-year existence. While no Habitat projects are currently in the works within the city, according to Burns the organization completed a 20-home build in the city’s northern sector on East 18th Place near Star K Ranch Park seven years ago. In the second phase of a three-year plan, the homes completed in 2008 were all outfitted with solar panels and were built by various construction teams, such as all-woman and all-youth. Burns said that a common misconception is that Habitat donates homes for free, however the organization does in fact sell homes to low-income families, but with a zero-percent mortgage and with monthly payments that cannot exceed 30 percent of a resident’s gross monthly income.
“We’ve been serving this community for many years, and first started building Aurora homes in the 1980’s,” Burns said. “We like to have a ReStore open in every community we service and we’re really excited to be able to expand to this part of town because it’s an area we’ve always wanted to be in — it was the right time and location to get more introduced and more integrated.”
From incinerators to avocado green stoves, it’s always a bit of a gamble as to what may come through the doors of any given ReStore, according to Smith, who said the operations offer customers the chance to find those rare pieces to accent a specific room or design project.
“The draw for the ReStore is being able to find those unique pieces you won’t find in a Home Depot or a store like that; we offer more of those conversation pieces,” said DJ Hagerman, manager of the ReStore in Denver. “And the longer we stay open and the more we get out into the community, the higher quality donations we get – I’ve seen a huge increase in quality in the last year alone.”
Hagerman specified that her store’s biggest sellers have traditionally been furniture, appliances and cabinetry, with an increased demand for insulation during the winter months.
And despite ReStores’ going rate of up to 80 percent off the retail value of certain items, as well as product-overlap with other industry heavy hitters such as Home Depot and American Furniture Warehouse, Smith said that Habitat’s retail operations in fact augment what could otherwise be seen as competition.
“We are very complementary to the Home Depots of the world, and we actually work very closely with stores like that, furniture outlets and plumbing contractors,” he said. “Either they had over-run product, or product they didn’t need any more, and they like it too, because it then funds their goods and services right back into the community.”
Smith added that Facebook and Instagram are great ways to track what comes into any given metro area store, though coming in and perusing the aisles is the only assured way to make sure nothing slips by unnoticed.
“You have to go there and shop often because you never know what’s going to be there,” he said. “Part of it is a shopping experience rather than just coming in and leaving. The idea is that we want to try to make it a little bit of a treasure hunt.”
FAR OUT!!