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Charlotte in Blume

The Blume family name is on two buildings in Charlotte — one sells tools, the other saves lives.

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Blume Supply's two generations of owners, Don (L) and Steve (R) have deep roots in and a proud relationship with the city of Charlotte.

By Tom Hammel, Contractor Supply Magazine

Photos by Ron Deshaies, 704-365-3754

Blume is a familiar name to many residents of Charlotte and its surrounding areas for more than one reason. When people enter one Blume building, they are praying for a miracle. When they enter the other, Blume Supply, there’s no mistaking that they are in a serious power tool store. This story is about both buildings.

“Not too many years ago we had over 12,000 power tools in this building, physically counted,” says Steve Blume, president and second-generation owner of Blume Supply.  “We carried 13 lines of power tools. We were also a master distributor for a lot of people who couldn’t afford to buy in volume and get that pricing and we resold to them. We still have 43 distributors that we sell to on a resale basis, but everybody’s inventory is half of what it was in 2006, ‘07 and ‘08.”

Today Blume carries 11 lines of power tools, with DeWalt as its number one brand.

“DeWalt is our biggest line, followed by Bosch, Milwaukee, Porter-Cable and Makita. Those are our big five.”

Safety is another major category for the company.

“Capital Safety is one of our best safety lines. We do very well with it,” says Randy Sprinkle, Blume Supply’s vice president. “We carry six of eight major safety brands because we have contractors out there who have specific needs. They will say, ‘I’ve got to have Guardian,’ or ‘My company specifies Fallsafe,’ or  maybe they demand FallTech. So we make sure we cover all of those customers.”

“It used to be that we only sold safety products to the commercial contractors, but now OSHA is getting as strict with the guy down the street as it is with the big guys working on the towers.” — Randy Sprinkle, Blume Supply

And with the current regulations, the next person in need of safety products is the next person in the door.

“It used to be that we only sold safety products to the commercial contractors, but now OSHA is getting as strict with the guy down the street as it is with the big guys working on the towers,” Sprinkle adds.

“Plus, in the fastener category, Ramset Redhead has always been a good line for us, from their end as well as ours,” he adds. And we do a lot of business with Simpson Strong-Tie, too.”

Wood Central
But what really sets the store apart is its machinery. The front “aisle” of the glass-fronted store is lined all the way with woodworking machinery from Powermatic, Delta, Jet and Steel City table saws, band saws, routing stations, planers, jointers and related woodworking machines.

“I’ve loved woodworking since I was in the seventh grade,” Blume explains. “I talked my father into putting in machinery back in our first building, next door to this one. And it took off — it got huge.”

“For a time we were the largest dealer of Powermatic machinery in the nation and we did that within three years of picking up the line. In the 1980s I had an ad running in Fine Woodworking Magazine and we could not keep the machines in stock. We would order one and one-half tractor trailer loads of machines at a time, set them out in our parking lot and in two weeks they were gone.”

Blume’s woodworking sales were also helped by the fact that North Carolina has a long tradition of woodworking.  But the recession took its toll on retailers who focused too narrowly on that market.

“The standalone woodworking stores that were plentiful in Charlotte in 2005 aren’t here anymore,” he adds. “So now it is a niche that brings in another clientele that our competition doesn’t have, and it has also helped us get through the lean times.”

“I’ve loved woodworking since I was in the seventh grade,” Blume explains. “I talked my father into putting in machinery back in our first building, next door to this one. And it took off — it got huge.” — Steve Blume, Blume Supply

“We are more alone in this market than we were, and our lines make us even more unique because we sell high quality machines and tools that last. That sets up sort of a catch-22 situation for us though — we don’t get as much repeat machinery business because it lasts forever,” he pauses and laughs, “but the customers remember our honesty and service and buy other tools, machinery, materials and accessories from us.”

Show Time
In 1986, Blume started doing woodworking shows at the Merchandise Mart in Charlotte. Each year Blume would prepare for the show for up to two months.

“I would buy and buy and buy,” he recalls. “People thought I was crazy. All I did was buy power tools, machinery and accessories and palletize them.”

Blume would rent 2,000 square feet of booth space and set up a small Blume Supply store — in one day.

“On Friday at noon, there would be literally thousands of people in line,” he says. “It grew to the point where at one show we topped $500,000 in two and a half days. It was fun but it was a lot of hard work.”

The woodworking show honeymoon ended with the recession, so Blume decided to pull out of the Merchandise Mart and set up closer to home.

“Now when they hold the show there, I have our own show here on the same weekends,” Blume says. “We don’t sell as much but it’s a lot less work. We would advertise free admission and parking and a free lunch with a purchase. It worked.”

Blume Supply’s glass store front bathes the showroom in natural light. Woodworking machinery makes a bold statement right from the door. The machinery also blocks off the aisles in the front. This forces customers to walk past the sales counter to reach the products in the aisles.

High visibility
Inside the store, the woodworking machinery creates a corridor that controls traffic inside the adjacent product aisles too. Customers can see all the woodworking machinery in one leisurely stroll down the bright front aisle.

Customers interested in other product such as fasteners, power tools, marking paints, masonry bits and traffic control products are funneled into the store, right past the sales counter and then back into the respective aisles like the teeth of a comb.

This layout enables store staff to greet each customer on the way in and forces all foot traffic past the counter coming into the store and going back out, which also serves to reduce theft.

Blume Supply at a Glance

Founded: 1974 Ownership: Privately held Location: Charlotte, N.C. Facility: 20,000 sq. ft.;  showroom: 3,500 sq. ft. Employees: 13 Sales Staff: 8 total Markets: Commercial and residential construction, woodworking Services: Tool repair, rental, blade sharpening, delivery Line Card: (Advertisers this issue in bold) Bosch, Capital Safety, CMT, Coleman Cable, Delta Machinery, DeWalt, Diamond Products, Drillco, Driltec, Empire Level, ERB, Fallsafe, FallTech, Fasco America, Freud, General Tools, Goldblatt, Guardian, Hitachi, ICS Blount, Irwin, ITW Ramset, ITW Red Head, JET, Kett Tool, Klein Tools, Knaack, Kraft Tool, Lackmond, Louisville Ladder, Makita, Metabo, Michigan Ladder, Milwaukee, Mi-T-M, Motorola, Paslode, Pearl Abrasives, Porter-Cable, Ridge Tool, Powermatic, Rubbermaid, Simpson Strong-Tie, Stanley, Steel City, Stihl, Timberland Boots, Triumph Twist Drill, TruCut/Galaxy, Weather Guard, Werner Co., Yamaha Affiliations: STAFDA, AGC Website: www.blumesupply.com

Drills, impact drivers, circular saws and rotary hammers are stocked in an open area bounded on the left by the wall into the company administrative offices and by the sales counter along the store’s back wall.

This side of the store is windowed as well, enabling customers and sales staffers at the desks inside a clear view of each other. The glass wall lets natural light into the office area and allows the office manager and sales people to see customers coming in and generally keep an eye on activity in the store in case the sales counter needs a hand.

All Hands
With a staff of just 13 employees, nearly everyone facilitates sales in one way or another, and everybody pitches in as needed. From time to time an emergency order generates a call for all hands on deck. One recent example came from one of Blume’s national accounts customers in Brooklyn, New York of all places.

“When Hurricane Sandy hit they called me up on a Friday afternoon and said, ‘Steve, we’re in a bind, we need some stuff delivered by tomorrow, next-day air, for a.m. delivery.’ I said no problem. Then we got the P.O.s — for $600,000. I locked the door. It took everybody here because we had half a day to get it done. I had our office manager Donna Willhite writing tickets, the warehouse guys pulling orders and our repair technician doing packaging. We filled the items on that P.O. that we had in stock and got it out on time.”

Blume Supply doesn’t typically serve many customers in New York but the company’s service area has grown during the recession simply out of necessity. Whereas in the past, Blume sales staff rarely needed to venture outside of Charlotte, the company now generally works in a 50-mile radius.

It is tempting with some businesses to ask which came first, the tool or the repair, but in Blume’s case they came together. Founder Don Blume launched the company in 1974 with one employee, a tool repairman. Within 90 days that employee decided the business was doomed and quit, leaving Don with a one-man operation financed by a $15,000 mortgage on his own home. Don and Steve repaired tools themselves before Don hired another tech.

Blume’s mechanic, Steve Swanger, has been in the business for 20 years. He services “just about everything we sell, from air and electric tools to gas engines and air compressors. Yesterday a customer brought me 40 grinders to repair.”

That first repair tech might have been happier if he had stayed. Blume’s current mechanic, Steve Swanger, has been in the business for 20 years. He services “just about everything we sell, from air and electric tools to gas engines and air compressors. Yesterday a customer brought me 40 grinders to repair.”

“A critical component of success is identifying your key people and keeping them,” Blume adds. “The core six employees of Blume have an average tenure of over 25 years here, not counting my father and myself. This allows relationships to grow with customers as well as within our own organization. Aside from having a wealth of product knowledge, we also look at each other as family, and a lot of our success is directly attributable to these people.”

Although most competitors folded their awnings during the recession, Blume Supply is still here, about to start its 40th year in business. Blume has benefitted from the deep roots it has in Charlotte and the relationship the Blume family has with the town. Charlotte is a strong, banking-dominated market: the city’s population grew nearly 65 percent from 2000 to 2010.

“We’re very fortunate to be in Charlotte because it is such a strong city,” Blume observes. “Recently, we were once again named the fastest growing city in the country. Building is booming again.”

“Our customers have been such long-time customers that they know what we stand for. When we make a sale it doesn’t end when the customer goes out that door. We call and ask you how it’s doing. We ask you what else we can do for you. If there’s a problem, we fix it — we always have. We are very thankful for such loyal customers.”

“As the business grew we were able to give back to that cause, we increased the amounts we gave. I was very honored and surprised when they decided to open a cancer clinic in 2001 and asked if they could name it after our family." — Don Blume

Giving back
Blume’s relationship with Charlotte has another face, one infinitely more meaningful to many residents than that of Blume Supply. In the late 1960s, a family tragedy led the Blume family into a long-standing relationship with Charlotte’s medical providers. When Don Blume’s business started to become profitable in the early 1980s, he began repaying their kindness with donations.

“Giving back became an annual thing,” Steve Blume says. “As my father’s business grew — and I say my father’s business out of respect because he’s the one who sacrificed everything, he paved the way — as Blume Supply became more profitable, the gifts became larger."

"They just wanted to give back. My father always said that God was his senior partner and he wanted to help the other people who helped us when we had nothing. Then, in 2001 the hospital contacted us and asked if they could name a clinic after our family.”

Today the Presbyterian Blume Pediatric Hematology and Oncology Clinic is part of Charlotte’s Presbyterian Healthcare system. The specialty of this “other” Blume building is the treatment of children’s cancers.  

“I have the greatest respect for what my father did and what he went through so that I could be here doing this today,” Blume says. “He built this business and this building for his children. ”

At 84, Don Blume, Sr. still comes to work a few hours each week, although now his health too is declining. Don credits his wife, his faith and his family for helping him build Blume Supply and enabling him to give back a little of what the city gave them in times of need.

“I tell everyone that God built this business, not me,” Don Blume says. “I also couldn’t have done this without Steve. He has been here almost from day one and is so versatile and knowledgeable that I don’t know what I would have done without him.”

The Presbyterian Blume Pediatric Hematology and Oncology Clinic is part of Charlotte’s Presbyterian Healthcare system.

Of the clinic that bears his name, Don says, “As the business grew we were able to give back to that cause, we increased the amounts we gave. I was very honored and surprised when they decided to open a cancer clinic in 2001 and asked if they could name it after our family. I give all the credit for that to God.” CS