Celebrating 125 years in business
From hardware to flowers to special gifts, Mitchell Hardware has had it covered in New Bern
If Mitchell’s doesn’t have it, you don’t need it.
That’s a common refrain among customers of Mitchell Hardware, a downtown New Bern staple for 125 years.
“We say it’s a little bit of everything, that we’re a hardware store turned general store, that we sell hardware, garden, home items and gifts,” said Lindsay Sims, who, with her sister, Winnie Smith, owns the shop and tourist spot.
It’s a venerable New Bern business with quite the history. The Mitchell family started it in 1898 as a livery stable, eventually changing it into a hardware store.
“It was definitely one of the first businesses in New Bern,” Sims said. “It was a true livery stable, with horse-and-buggy items.”
The Mitchell family owned it until 1987, until Harold and Pat Talton, Sims’ and Smith’s great uncle and aunt, bought it, and Greg Smith, their father, began running it.
“He made it more of a general store, bringing in jams, jellies, cast-iron skillets, baskets, garden seed and other things to make it a more rounded store,” Sims said. “Over the years, he expanded it into a full gift shop, with garden and hardware.”
It takes a couple or more visits to Mitchell Hardware to take it all in, Winnie Smith said.
“We’ve packed products into every nook and cranny of the store,” she said.
Greg Smith bought the business in 2011, and his daughters became owners when he died unexpectedly in January 2018.
Before they took over, Smith, a graduate of the University of North Carolina Wilmington, was managing a restaurant near Mitchell’s, and Sims, a graduate of the Savannah College of Art and Design, was working in Atlanta, but they both had assumed they’d return someday to run the family business.
“It really has worked well with our backgrounds,” Smith said. “Lindsay had the interior design and sales background, and I was in communication and hospitality. When we did end up coming together, we both brought different skills but also had a lot of similarities, as well, especially being raised together by our father.”
Both have fond memories of helping their dad in the store.
“We grew up in the store,” Sims said. “We’d come into the store and sit on the counter and wave to people. We’d each come and work a little bit, helping our dad. We really grew up in the business. It was like another home for us.”
Some Mitchell family members and Pat Talton are alive and living in New Bern, and Sims and Smith have been working to build on their success. These days, business at Mitchell Hardware is split down the middle between local customers and tourists, Smith said.
“It’s a good balance,” she said. “Our staff has to be very well rounded and be able to switch gears at any moment from maybe selling a single screw to selling garden seeds to wrapping a gift for someone.”
The store practices what its owners preach: the customer always comes first.
“We tell our staff that people can shop anywhere or easily order online, but they come to us for the experience,” Smith said. “They know that we care and we’re going to help them.”
Sims said they often add product lines to Mitchell’s because of inquiries from customers.
“We’re constantly listening to our customers and their needs,” she said. “When we think of improvement and growth, it comes down to, ‘How can we better serve you?’ As long as we’re keeping up with our customers’ needs, we’re happy.”
That’s something that has been a hallmark of Mitchell’s from the very beginning, a sense of being central to the New Bern community and a place where people might just drop by to say hello.
“Our absolute favorite part about working here is chatting with the customers,” Sims said. “Something iconic about Mitchell’s has always been we have things on the sidewalk – plants in the spring like flowers and herbs and vegetables and chrysanthemums in the fall. … We are known for people walking by or driving by, and someone is on the sidewalk watering, and we’re waiting for them. They know when we have things out, we’re open. It brings the sidewalk to life a little bit and connects the town.”
That sense of community has remained even as New Bern has grown, Smith said.
“It has been neat for us to see all the changes and all the growth our town has had while still seeming like a small town,” she said.
Both sisters have been involved in the community, much like their father Greg was when he ran and owned Mitchell Hardware.
“Winnie and I are seeing kind of a mirroring happen,” Sims said. “Dad had partnerships and friendships with others trying to grow businesses, and they started all these committees to help improve the town together. And now Winnie and I are on the same kind of committees and having the same conversations. It’s just really cool that we have the opportunity that dad had of being involved in creating a really cool place to live and work.”
As Mitchell Hardware embarks on its next 125 years, there’s already another generation waiting in the wings.
“Lindsay’s daughter Savannah is 6, and she’s coming into the store just like we did,” Smith said. “She’s filling our shoes.”
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