Rathbun Lumber adds new storage facility
By Scott Mitchell Johnson
Staff Writer
PRESQUE ISLE — Recent changes to the city’s zoning laws have enabled Rathbun Lumber to undertake several projects at its 43 State St. location.
Many have noticed the new construction going on, which has piqued their curiosity. The 66-year-old company has extended its retail building to incorporate an 84-foot by 65-foot cold storage warehouse.
Jamie McLaughlin, Rathbun Lumber’s store manager, said the building will be used to store things such as vinyl siding, doors, windows, stove pipe, and special order items including kitchen cabinetry. These items are currently stored in various buildings on the property and at their State Road storage area.
“Currently we have stock stored in different buildings, so this will allow us to pull in a lot of the things we sell most, bringing them all under one roof. By doubling our storage space on site, we’ll also be able to keep more in stock,” said McLaughlin. “Once we get the new building done, we’ll tear down one of our existing storage buildings. By doing that, we’ll be able to open up the yard and make it more accessible for customers and suppliers.”
Owners Alden and Pat Rathbun noted, “As delivery trucks have gotten bigger, accessibility to the business has gotten tighter; some of the trucks seem nearly as long as the store, and when there’s a truck out there with a forklift maneuvering around it, it ties up customer traffic.”
McLaughlin explained that on Thursdays, “We get anywhere from 10 to 16 shipments in. The big trucks enter on State Street and exit through the Parsons Street driveway. We sometimes have two or three big trucks waiting on State Street for their turn to unload; we can only handle one at a time. With this expansion, we’re hoping to be able to fit two to four.”
The new storage area is part of an overall reorganization plan that will not only improve the appearance of the business, but will allow more efficiency in several ways. Once the inventory is relocated to the new building, the existing storage building, which is about 50 years old and no longer meets the company’s needs, will be torn down. That area will be paved over to provide better parking.
“Tearing down the old building will increase our parking space significantly. The new configuration will more than double the parking here. It will open the yard up and make things look nice,” said Pat. “The expansion of our storage facility is going to make it easier for us, easier for customers, and it’s going to make the traffic flow so much better. It’s long overdue.”
Alden said the company has tried to do things in the past, but was always prevented by zoning restrictions.
“We found out last summer that parts of the city had been rezoned, and we would be able to build on. Up until then, residential zoning on both sides had us pretty boxed in. We weren’t even allowed to put up a regular-sized business sign on our Parsons Street right-of-way,” he said. “It’s fortunate for us things have changed to allow for expansion and we are thankful to those involved.”
Several subcontractors have been involved in the project. Scovil Building Supply, Inc. in Blaine constructed the building’s shell in November and will return to finish the job when weather permits.
“We’re not storing anything in there yet, but will begin installing storage racking any day now,” said McLaughlin. “However, we put all our trucks in the building during the subzero temperatures at the beginning of January. That was convenient.
“The large doors will allow for freight to come in through the door, and for customers to drive in and be dry when they are loading,” he said. “It’ll be an advantage in the wintertime to store things right here, where they’ll stay dry for loading. The building had to be large enough for a forklift to get around.”
While the project is slated to be finished by May 1, Alden said phase 2 of the expansion project is to redo the front of the store.
“We want the store to look as nice as the new storage facility is going to,” he said, “so we’ll be making improvements to the front of the store itself and try to make everything more uniform.”
