Published: April 19, 2007 11:59 pm            

Russell’s Tractor Supply Co. offers more than just parts

RUSSELL — The name of the business, Rodney Baugh admits, can be a little misleading.

The store Baugh manages is called Tractor Supply Co. But, there’s nary a John Deere or Massey Ferguson to be found anywhere.

“Most of our stores don’t even sell tractors, unless you’re talking about the small lawn kind,” Baugh said. “We do carry equipment for the big ones, though.”

After a gestation period of a few months, Tractor Supply finally opened its doors last week in the Ashland Plaza shopping center. The store shares a portion of the former Ames and Hill’s building with Hobby Lobby.

Tractor Supply’s name also would seem to imply that it’s primarily a farm supply outlet, but that’s not necessarily the case, either.

While Baugh acknowledged the company’s primary goal is to meet the needs of farmers and ranchers, he said those people are far from the store’s only clientele.

“Anyone who’s got a couple of acres of ground to tend to is going to find items that they need here,” he said.

Amateur gardeners, pet owners, contractors and rural homeowners are among TSC’s most avid shoppers, Baugh said.

In addition to livestock feeds and other farm products, items Tractor Supply stocks include fencing, lawnmowers, hardware items, tools, pet foods and a full line of work clothing and footwear.

Katie Hager said she used to shop at Tractor Supply when she lived in South Carolina. She said she was happy to finally have one a relatively short distance from her home in Louisa.

“You can find all kinds of stuff here,” she said. “It’s kind of like one-stop shopping.”

Ronnie Holt, also of Louisa, said he found shopping at Tractor Supply to be preferable to trying to track down items in a “big box” retail outlet.

“This type of store, I really like,” said Holt, who had a 52-pound bag of dog food in his shopping cart.

The Russell location is Tractor Supply’s 26th in Kentucky and its first in the northeastern corner of the state. Previously, the closest stores to the Tri-State were in Hurricane, W.Va., and Chillicothe, Ohio.

Tractor Supply was founded in 1938 by Charles E. Scmidt Sr. of Chicago as a mail-order outlet for tractor parts, according to the company’s Web site. A year later, it had grown into a successful retail store in Minot, N.D.

Today, Tractor Supply has 540 stores in 33 states, and is continuing to expand. According to Baugh, the Russell store is one of 80 new ones the company plans to open this year.

The Russell Tractor Supply employs 18. Baugh said he may have to hire more, depending on how sales are.

Although it wasn’t necessarily planned that way, Baugh said the timing of the store’s opening was pretty close to perfect.

“I just hope we didn’t miss out on too many lawnmower sales,” he said.

KENNETH HART can be reached at khart@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2654.

        

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