Dateline: March 17, 2005

Outpost adds new products to line up

By Roger Estlack, Clarendon Enterprise

New products continue to arrive and line the shelves of The Clarendon Outpost as the store changes to meet the needs of more local customers.

As one of the most popular stores in town, the Outpost is experiencing a lot of changes as it approaches its tenth anniversary later this year. Gone are the Radio Shack and video rentals, and in their places have been placed a wide variety of goods that customers have said they want.

“When Duckwall’s closed (last November), it left a big gap,” said Outpost owner Paul Bivens. “A lot of people asked us to fill that gap.”

Bivens and his wife, Elmonette, have brought a Ben Franklin variety franchise into the Outpost and are now offering a large department of dollar merchandise in addition to fabric, sewing and knitting supplies, and artificial flowers.

“A lot of toys are coming soon as well as a sporting goods department that will focus on fishing,” Bivens said.

To make room for the new merchandise, the Outpost reoriented its Branigan’s Jewelry department and moved its Hallmark selection across the store.

The changes are coming in large part to surveys sent in by readers of The Clarendon Enterprise in which they were asked to list the craft and variety merchandise they wanted to see in the Outpost, which is located at US 287 and Koogle Street.

“We’ve run a few surveys in the last 30 years that I’ve been in business,” Bivens said, “but we had more response to that survey than anything we’d ever done. There must have been more than 100 people that cut it out of the paper, filled it out, and sent it to us; and I figure that many more must have looked at it.”

Bivens said it’s taking a while to get everything in place, and advertising for much of the Ben Franklin goods won’t start until July, but already he is seeing an increase in store traffic.

“We’ve had more people walking around and shopping in here than normal lately.”