ASQUITH, Sask. – The 1906 building has seen a lot of owners come and go.
It is featured in historic pictures of Asquith, a Saskatchewan town whose highway sign proclaims it the centre of the British Empire.
While fire and the vagaries of man have changed the look of some structures on the wide main street, this plain, long and narrow building has stuck with its commercial purpose. For 80 years it has been a general store.
The newest owners, Michelle Arneson and Richard Ebben, took over the store eight months ago. After seven years as long distance truckers, they wanted to stay put for a while and enjoy a new grandson.
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“We were tired of living life at 80 miles per hour,” said Ebben.
“Yeah, now we have slowed down to 65 or 70 mph,” added Arneson.
The roof may need reshingling and the original hardwood floor near the meat counter slants, but Arneson and Ebben see them as quirks that help keep the store’s character. Ebben intends to fix the roof this year and to add teleposts in the basement, but there have been more pressing matters for the new owners.
It was a steep learning curve. The $54,000 needed to buy the store and inventory came from their own savings and a low-interest loan through the federal agency Women Entrepreneurs of Saskatchewan Inc.
The first two weeks were horrible, Arneson said, but they praise the help they got from their four staff, including one who used to own the store in the 1970s.
Now they have settled into a routine. Arneson and Ebben were used to long hours as truckers, spelling each other off. They have continued that with their store, which is open seven days a week from 8 a.m. weekdays and 10 a.m. weekends to 10 p.m. every night. Once a week Ebben will drive to nearby Saskatoon to buy stock and Thursday is delivery day from their suppliers.
Besides meat, canned and packaged goods and the ever-popular chips, candy and soft drinks, the store rents videos and sells bottled water – lots of big bottles because the local well water is terrible and looks like tea, Arneson said.
The Asquith General Store stands beside the co-op grocery store, but Ebben said the two are not competitors. Each serves a complementary purpose and his store acts more like a convenience centre for people to top up forgotten items or supplement their regular shopping when friends come to town.
“We have newspapers and the lottery that they don’t have,” he said.
The general store also serves as a gathering spot. Since the grain elevator is gone, people like to talk to each other in the store or its back rooms, where staff and customers take smoke breaks. Hunters last fall would drop in at 7 a.m. for coffee and a chat before the store opened.
“People come to visit and it’s great to talk, but it’s hard to get the work done,” Arneson said.
“But that’s why they come back,” added Ebben. “I like talking to people.”
Some of that talking led them to install coffee and popcorn machines at customers’ requests. The store also welcomes children with special events, such as the 77 who signed up for the Easter egg hunt or those who entered the pumpkin carving contest last fall.
“We get a lot of kids here as customers,” said Arneson. “Lunch time is a zoo.”
She points at Ebben and said, “he’s the bike repairman, the vehicle fixer, the first aid centre for kids when they stick their fingers in the spokes.”
They agree that Asquith supports its businesses. Arneson said when the police and fire departments have a function, they buy from both the general and co-op stores.
A couple of blocks south of the store, a steeple-like building that was the former fire hall is being turned into a museum that will include artifacts now standing in the yard such as farm machinery and a wooden wagon.
Arneson and Ebben say the town has a future, as well as a past.
“We’re never going to die. There were five new houses last year,” said Ebben.
Arneson said people are moving out of the city and setting up on acreages near Asquith. The town has 575 people and a trading area of double that.
Ebben doesn’t know how long they will stick with the store.
“It’s the kind of business you can do until you’re 80. If we can get some freedom (from the hours), we’ll keep at it.”
