Here, it's all about service

Big Jo Hardware wins Small Business of Year award

Bob Quick | The New Mexican

6/30/2008 - 7/1/08

Yolanda Hoemann and John Anderson don't know each other, but they both shop at Big Jo True Value Hardware, the city of Santa Fe's 2008 Small Business of the Year.

And they both like the Siler Road business with perhaps the friendliest staff in Santa Fe.

"I love it — it's the most helpful store in town," Anderson said as he got into his car after a visit to Big Jo. "It's the best hardware store I've ever been in."

Hoemann concurred. "It's the only store where they really, truly help you," she said. "They walk right up to you and ask if they can help — they're the best."

Rick C de Baca and his brother Ron, as well as their niece Jessica C
de Baca, know all about the good service — they're the vice president, president and operations manager, respectively, of the store, which prides itself on being a small, locally owned business up against two industry giants, Home Depot and Lowe's, as well as smaller competitors.

Providing fast, friendly service is one way Big Jo can compete with the big-box stores, in which customers sometimes can't find any help at all.

But in some circumstances, Big Jo staffers will back off on customers, Rick C de Baca said.

"Once in a blue moon," he said, "a customer will say, 'I don't need help. I just want to look around.' And that's just fine."

To be chosen as the city's top small business, Big Jo had to meet criteria ranging from "excellence in customer service" to "business growth," "employee benefits" and "green business practices."

In coming out on top, the hardware store had to beat out around 30 other businesses.

"It was quite an honor," Rick C de Baca said.

Big Jo Lumber was founded in the 1920s on West San Francisco Street and was a successful business for many years before it was purchased in the 1980s by the Zeckendorf Corp., which wanted to build a hotel. The Eldorado Hotel opened on the 2-acre site in 1986. There was a hotel by the same name on the property in the 1850s.

Richard C de Baca, the father of Rick and Ron, had retired as chief of the New Mexico State Police around the time Big Jo Lumber was being acquired. He suggested that his sons might be interested in buying the inventory of the business and opening a store elsewhere in Santa Fe.

John Hillyard, one of the principals in Big Jo Lumber, said at the time that the store's lumber business was no longer feasible but that the hardware business was "doing fine."

Frances C de Baca, Rick and Ron's mother and a vice president at First National Bank of Santa Fe, "got the loan for us" to open the store, Rick C de Baca said.

The C de Bacas opened Big Jo Hardware in 1983 in a 12,000-square-foot building on Siler Road that had formerly housed a moccasin factory and then, in the 1970s, a roller disco rink.

The C de Bacas didn't expect to make a profit right away, and they were advised it might take from three to five years to do so.

At one point, The New Mexican ran a photograph of the demolition of Big Jo Lumber's building on West San Francisco Street.

"Everybody thought that was us," Rick C de Baca said. "People thought we were closed. It took a while to overcome that."

Home Depot opened in 2000, "which affected us for about a year," Rick C de Baca said. "We bounced back in 2001."

Over the years, the C de Bacas have remodeled and expanded the store three times, most recently three months ago, when they added 3,000 square feet to the business by leasing an adjoining building.

"It made the store a lot more shopper-friendly," Jessica C de Baca said.

There is now space for such items as air conditioners and swamp coolers as well as water heaters and rain barrels.

"When Samon's closed (last year), we hired their manager and assistant manager to help us expand," Rick C de Baca said.

Lowe's is another large competitor Big Jo deals with, but the impact of the second big-box hardware store has been slight.

"We got a lot of spinoff from the big stores," Jessica C. de Baca said. "Their employees told customers, 'If you can't find it here, why don't you go to Big Jo?' "

As for pricing, "our everyday pricing in some departments is a little higher," Rick C de Baca said, "but our service makes up for the difference."

Big Jo does a lot of business with local contractors and with government entities as well as with Santa Fe's many hotels and motels.

"We take it down to them the same day," Rick C de Baca said of the hotel customers.

The ongoing housing downturn has slowed sales to builders, but that's been made up for by what the hardware industry calls DIYs, or do-it-yourselfers.

"They're an important source of cash flow," Rick C de Baca said. "Sometimes an individual comes in here two or three times per day."

Big Jo employs about 25 to
28 people full and part time, which is "a lot of staff" for
13,000 square feet, he said.

Employees have a retirement plan to which the company contributes. Big Jo also pays
50 percent of employees' health, dental and vision insurance premiums. Also, employees receive two bonuses per year based on the company's performance.

"A large percentage of our employees are retired, and they're very reliable," Rick C de Baca said. "We don't have a lot of turnover."

Big Jo has considered opening another store on the north side on Santa Fe, including in the old Albertsons store at DeVargas Center. But the cost of leasing space is too high, Rick C de Baca said.