Jim Ivy takes pride in his yard’s 2015 designation by the Texas Historical Commission as a Texas Treasure Business. That’s an award given to Lone Star State businesses that have been in continuous operation by the same family for at least 50 years.
Early Days
My granddad, Victor Wallace, bought the place [then known as Harrison Lumber] in 1939. I’ve got some invoices from 1940 when 2x4s went for about five cents a running foot. He started another yard in Rankin, 65 miles away, and my grandmother ran the Fort Stockton yard from 1953 to 1963. In 1963, the Rankin yard was closed. Taking over the business was something I always wanted to do. My wife, a retired schoolteacher, works here with me. She’s the bookkeeper, and she runs me. It’s kind of like what happens when we go on a trip. The only thing I get to do is hold the steering wheel. She does the driving.
How We Operate
The main store is an old shotgun building. But we cover an entire block with the building and storage. We’re a destination store. You come here for a reason. We have a McCoy’s Building Supply here, but the competition is friendly. Our service is how we differentiate ourselves. From the moment you walk in, we say, “Can we help you?” And we aren’t going to point you, we’re going to take you. The majority of our walk-in customers are DIYers.
New Opportunities
We have a lot of oil production and solar production farms in our area. We’re going to have the largest solar farms in the nation here, producing electricity. There are man camps being built all over the place, so we pick up that business. We stock a lot of big timbers for the oil companies and lots of posts and metal fencing for the ranchers.
A Stable Employer
We battle with the oil fields for employees. People find they might have a job there for six weeks, but with us, they can have a job as long as they want. I’ve got employees who’ve been with me for 10 and 20 years.
