125-year-old store stocked with charm

Deseret News (Salt Lake City), Apr 28, 2007 by Amy Choate-Nielsen Deseret Morning News

LEHI -- Broadbent's general store in Lehi sells just about everything short of pharmaceutical drugs, but that doesn't mean the store can't fill a prescription for a pick-me-up.

After years of running the 125-year-old family business, store owners Betty Anderson and Nann Frandsen are celebrating Broadbent's anniversary today and saying they've learned something about making people happy and working hard -- lessons taught to them by their father.

"The thing daddy wanted most was to make people happy," Frandsen said of her father, John Broadbent, who operated the store for most of her life. "Whether it was to give (customers) a box of oranges or a doll, or anything, he just wanted to make people happy."

As Anderson and Frandsen continue their father's tradition of hand-picking well-painted porcelain and inspecting every piece of merchandise before it hits the shelves, they work hard to maintain a business where people like to shop. They laugh with their customers, coo over babies and chatter about the good old days.

The social atmosphere makes shoppers want never to leave, and as they amble through the displays of furniture, fabric and myriad knickknacks, Frandsen says she hopes her customers will find "treasures from the past" to make memories for the future.

"One woman told me, 'This is better than Prozac,"' Anderson said. "You know that feeling when you go to Disney World and you feel like you're in a different world? We wanted to make (a store) that will make people feel better."

Anderson's daughter, Rebecca Ethington, runs one of the store's cash registers and stands in line to inherit the store, but she doesn't like to think about what she hopes will be a far-off day.

Broadbent's has been open in the same location -- at 128 N. 100 East in Lehi -- since 1882, and it survived hard times such as the Great Depression, but when bigger businesses came to town recently, Ethington said her mother was worried that the store might be hurt and have to close.

"We were really worried when Wal-Mart and Target came in," Ethington said. "We're a small business, and we can't buy in bulk. We thought that would be the end, but people kept coming."

One reason people keep coming, Ethington says, is because they find things at Broadbent's that they can't find anywhere else. The store sells antique toys, candy, baby clothing, quilts -- you name it -- but it also operates according to a higher law of history, like a true, old-fashioned general store.

When long-term customers call and say they need to buy a wedding present, Ethington says store employees will pick it out and wrap it up. When one elderly customer couldn't write well enough to fill out her checks, Ethington helped her on a weekly basis.

Anderson still uses a typewriter for business purposes, and rotary phones are regularly used in the shop. None of the store's merchandise is purchased on the Internet, and you won't find a Broadbent's Web site.

In fact, Broadbent's hardly advertises at all.

"Our word-of-mouth advertising is the best," Anderson said.

With 125 years of history behind the store, people know where to find the Broadbent's experience, Ethington said.

Better yet, they know that's where they can find friends.

E-mail: achoate@desnews.com