Hippo -the hardware "happening"

Home Channel News, August 10, 1998

Unusual Oregon store promotes values beyond the unique items it carries -

PORTLAND, ORE. - Where can you buy a good used urinal these days? They're hard to find, but Hippo Hardware & Trading has a row of them in its funky, three-floor store in a downtown neighborhood east of the Willamette River.

"They're a great Father's Day present for the workshop," said Steve Oppenheim, the 48year-old co-owner of this 20year-old store, which specializes in salvaged and reproduction lighting, fixtures and millwork.

The store, a 1918 antique itself; offers dozens of old doorknobs, a vast collection of towel hooks and heaps of bath faucets. Oppenheim estimates the store stocks more than a million pieces and generates about $1 million in annual sales.

The store also features an endless assortment of its trademark hippo - stuffed ones, ceramic ones, squatting on every counter and suspended above checkouts.

The hippos are gifts from well-wishers. They aren't for sale, but are part of the cluttered environment that makes Hippo Hardware more than a resource for old and old-looking home decor products. It's listed in the phone book under "Museums." Hippo is a happening.

Most hardware store owners seem to spend a good portion of their time thinking about inventory management, return on investment and profit margins; Hippo Hardware seems to thrive on a different value system. The owners see their store not just as a place to make money, but as a tool for social change in their community.

Socially conscious retailer

Oppenheim - better known as "Oppy" - and Steve Miller, his 50-year-old partner, frequently hire the homeless to work at the store. Over the years, they have taught different trades to employees, nine of whom have struck out to form their own businesses in such diverse fields as landscaping and metal polishing.

The company's sole form of advertising is on T-shirts worn by its 16 employees who volunteer four company-paid hours of their work week each to local charities. "A full-page ad in The Oregonian [Portland's daily newspaper] costs $2,500," notes Miller. "That much money buys lots of good work in our community."

The community outreach extends into the store, where a bathtub full of donated stuffed animals stands available for visiting children to play with or take home. The store is also home to a number of stray animals the owners have taken in. The brood currently includes a cat, a ferret and a cockatiel.

The owners could move their store to a more upscale neighborhood, but prefer to keep Hippo Hardware downtown. "These are our people, who supported us when we started out," said Miller. "If we moved to the suburbs, we'd be just another overpriced antique store."

When Hippo started back in 1977, Oppy was a self-described "burned-out social worker," and Miller was a former Navy Seal who had worked in goods procurement. They were looking for a business that would support their goal of helping their community, and gravitated into the salvage business because of Miller's background.

Their reputation grew rapidly. Now, Oppy said, they frequently arrive at work to find goods have been left on the doorstep overnight. Each month, they fill a dumpster with donations that are unusable. "People call us, or tell us about buildings that are going to come down," he said. "We go to a lot of estate auctions."

Some items, including $125 French doors and $500 clawfoot tubs, have waiting lists and don't usually spend more than a day in the store, Oppy said. High-end items include restored Victorian-era fixtures with both gas and electric hookups that sell for as much as $1,200, and Art Deco flipper-shade light fixtures for $650.

The general rule of thumb at the store for items of more recent vintage is "a functional old product is half the price of a new one," he added. But the corollary to the first rule is, "the more flash, the more cash."

But Hippo Hardware is "not about price points," Oppy said. "It's our incredible selection of unique items that makes referrals our main source of new business."

Finding the unfindable

The store has developed service niches that complement its expertise in antique fixtures. In the third-floor workshop is Hippo's UL-approved lighting-repair facility. The store rewires old or pre-electric fixtures, restores chandeliers, and buffs and polishes metallic fixtures.

One regular account, the local brew pub chain McMinnaman's, comes to Hippo Hardware for all the lighting for its old-time ambiance restaurants. The company creates retro-look fixtures and restores old ones.

When a dealer trafficks in restored and antique merchandise, offering free advice to customers in search of obscure items comes with the territory. For example, a customer calls in to ask if Hippo Hardware can convert his old, hard-wired rotary-dial telephone to modern, snap-in wire technology. It can't, but Miller doesn't hesitate to recommend the customer try Future Shop, a local consumer-electronics dealer.

A day at Hippo Hardware is filled with activity; customers clamber up and down the store's wooden stairs, some buying, others bringing in items to sell. After disappearing for some time and failing to respond to several raucous pages over the 30,000-square-foot store's P.A. system, Oppy appears, with an item.