Welcome to Rhode Island!

A lot of people ask what I spend most of my time doing with respect to this new venture. It's hard to say what I spend THE MOST time on. Different things come up at different times. There are corporate and finance matters, marketing, research, taping of the chairs, and very importantly, sourcing of inventory. The biggest issue on the sourcing side is retrieving the chairs once I find them. They are too large to ship via USPS or UPS and freight shipping is expensive and cost prohibitive as a re-seller. As a result, the limitation is the geographic region you are willing to drive. Fortunately, the weekend home is near two former Shaker communities, Watervliet and Mount Lebanon, Mount Lebanon being the community which produced most of the chairs. So there are chairs nearby. I keep an eye on local auctions, estate sales, as well as internet sellers and social media platforms. Then there is random word of mouth and things like the "wanted to buy" ads in newspapers near the local Shaker communtities. One of these ads led to my previous blog about Mrs. Hancock. Recently, the internet searching has yielded some results. Unfortunately, the pandemic has limited my appetite for overnight stays, so I did an entire day odyssey to get the pictured chairs. Typically I need to drive North, closer to the New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire or Connecticut communities. But you never know where these chairs end up, so this time it involved a drive south. First, I drove to Columbia, PA on a lead from eBay, and picked up the No. 5 Slat Back Arm Chair at an antique store. This is an armchair, not a rocker, and is my first one so I am super excited. It also brought be back to where my dad grew up and my grandmom is buried, so I know the area a little bit, and it was good to see the silos of rural Pennsylvania again. I then hopped over to North East, MD (passing Millersville University, which was fun) to pick up the Web Back No. 5 Rocker. It turns out to be a really sturdy chair and I got it a good price so I am super excited about that one as well. The rocker seat is all ripped and neither seats are original, so I have already ordered some new tape from Hong Kong and I can't wait to show everyone the results. Additionally, I obviously need to do a blog explaining all the chair numbers I keep talking about, especially since I have a new chair with a very interesting number to discuss. Stay tuned!!