Many Thanks Everyone... Our New Labrador Store Just Opened with a BANG!
Last week, we officially opened our new TradeTools Labrador store. We have wanted a store in the Labrador area for quite some time now but, to be brutally honest, we were not quite sure how it would go in Gibbs Street where it's located. Gibbs Street is quite a wide side street running off the Brisbane Road service road, although not hugely busy but still very well known by most of us Gold Coast locals. Anyway, we set up a fair sized store there in a building that we bought last year which we have since totally refurbished. Most importantly though, our building is quite large, easy to find & has plenty of parking. It officially opened on Monday May 8th &, quite amazingly, it exceeded its future projected target figure in its very first week of proper trading! That has never ever happened before across the full 30 year history of TradeTools & covering all of our 17 stores...... a new store hitting its projected future target in its first full week of trading...... totally unheard of!
And this is in an area with 2 other TradeTools stores within a short 20 -25 minute drive [Ormeau & Nerang] with a full size Bunnings within walking distance & a direct competitor [so called!] almost within sight of our own new Labrador storefront! Either we have done something very right, or the others have been doing something wrong, but figures rarely ever lie, especially in this industry!
For sure we have had quite a few loyal customers thank us for opening closer from where they usually buy from us, & we've even had older customers come to see us that once bought from our old Bundall store, a store that we finally closed & then moved out to Nerang some years ago. Thanks guys, we are very happy to see some familiar faces as it makes us feel that we must 'occasionally' be doing something right if we can keep customers for what is now decades of supplying tools & equipment to our fellow Queenslanders. Again, many thanks for that. And we never ever forget that we are a born & bred Queensland tool company, founded when Bjelke Petersen was still our notorious premier; in fact Gibbs Street, where our new TradeTools store is located, was named after one of Joe's colourful ministers way back then. We actually opened our very first TradeTools store a full 30 years ago this month & if you click the video below you will see a brief video of my colleague Rick Stewart & myself jokingly talking about some of our early experiences. Rick is the one wearing the daft hat...... one of his collection of 30 or so! Incidentally, Ricks son Jeremy is now our TradeTools managing director so, technically, we both now work for him, although both of us are now officially retired [read... can't really be sacked!] although we do both work part time still. Anyway, many thanks again to all of you who visited our new Labrador store. We never take your custom for granted; we never forget that you guys are the sole reason we are here; & our old slogan “Our Everyday Prices Are What The Others Call A Sale” is as true now as it was all of those 30 long years ago!
Our Very Best Regards.
Greg Ford on behalf of everyone at TradeTools.