Strategies_Spring2024

When One Chapter Ends, Another Begins Lowell Littrell, father of manager

Mike Littrell, was a sales representative for 17 years with Wyeth Hardware Co., covering northern Missouri and southern Iowa. In 1987, he left Wyeth Hardware and purchased North Missouri Lumber with a business partner, Gene Hogue. The location would eventually become Bethany Building Center. In 2003, Lowell asked his now-adult son to join him in the family business. Mike had completed a business management degree from Missouri Western State University and worked for five years in sales at Mid-Am Building Supply in Moberly, Missouri. The time was right, and father and son were eager to work together. Mike brought value to the business by creating house designs, a skill his father taught him to better assist customers— Relationship with Blish-Mize Bethany Building Center’s relationship with Blish-Mize can be traced back to Lowell’s former co-workers at Wyeth Hardware who joined the Blish-Mize sales team. In 1990, Bethany Building Center began exclusively using Blish-Mize as its supplier based on these connections. Bethany Building Center’s bond with Blish-Mize only grew stronger over the years and through different sales representatives. When the store’s current Blish-Mize sales representative, Randy Funk, suggested a store reset in 2023, Mike knew they were in good hands. Funk had been his representative for 12 years and had called on the store for even longer through the Blish-Mize DeWalt program. Ready, Set, Reset The goals of the Bethany Building Center reset were threefold: to better organize the product categories, add to the product offerings and refresh the store’s appearance and showroom displays. According to Funk, he and Mike began to seriously discuss the project in March 2023. They decided on the new layout, determined how to create additional space in the store and identified the categories they would expand. along with a work ethic and good, old-fashioned customer service.

In 2023, Bethany Building Center completed a comprehensive store reset to better organize the product categories, add to the product offerings and refresh the store’s appearance.

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