Stores cleared out of snow-removal gear
Louise Bowdish tosses yet another shovel load of snow from the sidewalk around her downtown Kalispell home Monday morning. Bowdish, 86, who was raised on a farm north of Kalispell, said the current snow levels are similar to what she remembers from her childhood in the 1930s. Bowdish's father was born in the Flathead Valley in 1892 and he and his family farmed land between Kalispell and Whitefish near today's Bowdish Road. (Karen Nichols/Daily Inter Lake)
There's been a run on snow shovels, snow rakes and snowblowers in the Flathead Valley, with area hardware stores scrambling to keep up.
Most local stores contacted by the Inter Lake on Monday reported selling out of snow-removal implements last week, well before the big snowfall of more than 26 inches since Jan. 1. Since then, retailers have been searching far and wide for available supplies to help customers dig out.
"We have pretty much scoured the Northwest to get our hands on anything," said Doug Shanks, general manager for nine Western Building Centers in Northwest Montana. "The demand is incredible out there. We have lists of people calling."
Shanks said the Whitefish store got a shipment of shovels Monday, but they weren't expected to last long. "Shipments' don't necessarily mean dozens of shovels.
"We got two shovels in this morning and they were gone three minutes after they got here," said Trey Heydon, a cashier at Western Building Center in Kalispell.
"We are scrambling right now trying to find suppliers," said Jerry Hart, manager of the Cardinal True Value store in Kalispell. "We are on the Internet looking to places in California that might have some in stock … We've been out for almost a week now of snow shovels, and snow rakes we've been out for probably two weeks."
Hart said the store sold about 40 snowblowers before the end of 2008. "Last year, we sold maybe 10," he added.
Hart and other store managers said it's not likely there will be additional snowblowers arriving, because manufacturers have set inventories that already are depleted.
"They only make them up until October and they switch to lawnmowers," he said of major snowblower manufacturers. "They're not even tooled up to make them right now."
That's the official word that Rick Nelson got from Ace Hardware on Monday.
"This is it for snowblowers," said Nelson, owner of Nelson's Ace Hardware in Whitefish.
However, the store did get a shipment of about 60 snow shovels Monday and more were expected to arrive Thursday.
Nelson and the other store managers said the high demand is not limited to Northwest Montana. Heavy snowfall in Washington, particularly in the Spokane area, has created a regional rush on hardware distribution centers.
Hart said the Cardinal store got a call from a man in Spokane who was looking for a snowblower.
"He said if you get a snowblower I'll come and pick it up," Hart said.
Charlie Stafford, an associate at the Kalispell Home Depot contractors desk, said the store sold out of snowblowers, snow shovels and roof rakes last week.
"There's just none to be found. I find that hard to believe but it's true," said Stafford, who learned later Monday that the next shipment of shovels is expected to arrive Jan. 12.
Stafford said Home Depot customers have been getting inventive, buying supplies to make their own snow rakes to remove the buildup from roofs.
The Western Building Center stores have turned to resourceful locals for snow rakes.
"We've actually found some local sources that are manufacturing snow rakes for us," Shanks said.
Reporter Jim Mann may be reached at 758-4407 or by e-mail at jmann@dailyinterlake.com