Who Is Arlene, the Business Woman?
Hobbymasters is the name of the store I have owned and operated
since 1975. It started out in a rental space, but in 1979 my ex-husband
and I bought the two story building that the store is now housed
in. In 1981, as part of a divorce settlement, I took over the
building and the business. At that time, the business was only
on the first floor since the second floor had no retail use -
just warehouse space. I had two employees to start out with.
In 1986 we redid the upstairs to be retail space - elevator and
all. Since then, the store has grown to 12 full-timers and averages
3 part-timers at any one time. I love to empower my employees
to do their own thing and to make their departments grow. The
standard joke is that I am not the boss - there are 7 of us (Grin).
In 1997, a mural was painted on the front of the building. Wow!
What a jump in sales!
We have also begun to advertise more since then. We maintain
a fully functional eCommerce website.
My daughter is the founder of Dawning
Designs and is our web designer (shameless plug). We advertise
in the newspapers, online, via emailings, and postcards to our
regular customers. But the thing that works the best for us is
our crazy television ads. To see the store, go to www.hobbymasters.com.
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