Shoppe One in Keen Street is celebrating a milestone in 2023, forty years in business. They say surviving the first two years of business is difficult but to last forty years is no mean feat, especially considering how tough the last six years have been for all retail shop owners in Lismore's flood-prone areas.

Shoppe One 17 was first opened in 1982 by Lorraine Olley, as Graham Palmer vaguely remembers. Shoppe One 17 operated from the front left-hand corner of the same Keen Street building as you entered the premises back then.

Elaine owned it for 12 months before needing to sell and that is when the Palmers started their long association with one of Lismore's iconic CBD shops.

"Veronica was working at Frith's Chemist on Keen Street which was next door to the family business which was the North Coast Hobby Centre. Frith's was closing down so Veronica was looking for something else to do and they bought this in 1983."

"They ran it together until Dad passed in 2011 and then Veronica passed in 2015," Graham explained.

As family businesses tend to do when each child inherits an equal share, the inevitable question comes up as to what is going to happen to Shoppe One 17.

"My oldest brother passed in 2011 so his share was held by his wife who had no interest, my next oldest brother lived in Canberra and he had no interest whatsoever about coming home to Lismore and being a shopkeeper and my sister was retired and enjoying being a grey nomad. So what do you do? Do you close it? Do you sell it? There weren't a lot of prospects back then but it did have good community support."

"Anyway, Janice was working at DPI in Wollongbar and I was working at the university and we thought let's take the business on as, I don't know, a crazy thing to do."

Graham and Janice took ownership in 2017, the start of what we now know as one of the toughest retail periods in Lismore's history.

Six weeks after the papers were signed, the 11.59 metre 2017 flood hit Lismore wiping out a lot of the money they had saved to put into the business. Add in some restructuring, adding solar panels to reduce a $10,000 electricity bill and reducing staff thanks to COVID and all of a sudden Graham and Janice needed to be more hands-on than they first set out to do.

Retail has changed a great deal over the years from no internet so no online shops to the simple way the bookkeeping was done.

"It was all done by hand in a book," Janice said, "They would write down what they sold in a column and then use a calculator to add up the takings. They didn't use computers"

It wasn't just technology that changed, retail trends were moving in another direction.

"One of the earlier core lines catered to the ageing population, things like figurines and collectables in general. Younger people don't identify with that sort of investment. Not many come in looking for that anymore, you know your Royal Dalton, Ashdene, crystal figurines. They would buy it and put it in a display cabinet to look at but not any more."

"People like functional stuff now. They have a lifestyle focused on the home so they have a nice kitchen and like good knives to go with that as well as cooking and baking items. They still like nice things but it has a real function to it, it has to serve a purpose. Bohemian crystal glasses or decanters were often in the cupboard to look at but now people buy it and use it when they get it home."

What has been the toughest period for the family in the last forty years?

"The early years were a bit tough," Graham replied, "The late '80s into the '90s with the recession we had to have.

"Our type of goods are discretionary spending so any type of economic strain certainly hits shops like us first. You pay for food and rent, then gas for the car and maybe some beers and your homewares purchase gets put off."

"The '17 flood used all of our personal cash to get back open so we had to sell a lot of collectables for not very much in order to create cashflow to pay staff, pay rent and all the rest of it.

Another loss in the 2017 flood was the Swarovski account, one that had been with Shoppe One (and Shoppe One 17 as it had been known) for the last 35 years.

"They opened their own shops. Pandora was another, we used to sell Pandora and now it is online or you have to go to the mall on the Gold Coast or Sydney or Melbourne. The online presence has taken the agencies away from the small retailers."

"There's no loyalty anymore," Janice chimed in, "They don't care about the history of supplying to retailers in Lismore. The same has happened with Wedgewood and Waterford Crystal. All those accounts have been withdrawn."

Since 2017, Graham and Janice have experienced a flood, nearly three years of COVID and then the largest flood Lismore has ever experienced. It's been a rough old ride.

"I was here for the '74 flood and it was a walk in the park compared to '22. Wow, I've never seen the place so wiped out."

"We've never seen what the shop can really do," Graham said, "Maybe in 2019 when things were picking up. We would love some clean air in the coming years but we know the town is rebuilding so it will take quite a bit of time."

"People say they love this shop and they have been coming in for years so let's hope that continues as the CBD slowly rebuilds."

To celebrate 40 years in business, Graham and Janice are putting different specials on each month. The first is a sale on the birthstone of each month so already this year that has included garnets, amethyst and aquamarine.

March is special for anyone who likes a stone that glistens as diamonds are 50% off followed by emeralds in May. You can check out their website to browse through the diamond range https://www.shoppeone.com.au/.

On top of that, different sections of Shoppe One move into a sale for a month.

For any business to survive 40 years, the last six years or the last 12 months they need your support to shop local.

You can wish Graham and Janice a Happy 40th at 117 Keen Street.

A side note. The Lismore App would normally include a lot of old photos from 40 years of trading but unfortunately, February 28 2022 destroyed them all.