Owner's Responses to Questions Posted by Facebook Fans - Questions 1-25

For our daily contest on 12-16-10 during the 10 Days of Soda Giveaway, our Facebook fans were asked to leave a comment, questions, or suggestion for Chuck, the owner of Old 52. Chuck loved reading all of the comments and suggestions, and earlier this week, he took some time out of his busy schedule to respond to the questions posed by our fans

Below you will find the original questions from our Facebook fans, along with Chuck’s responses (as prepared by Jess).

Question 1:  From Heather VanDusen: “Was wondering if you have or know if it is possible to get grape Nehi.”

Response:  We do currently carry Nehi Grape.

Question 2:  From RustyGeorgiana Strouth: “Is there any chance that there are any Zaps candy or the Betcha Life candy bar?”

Response:  According to our sources, both of those types of candy have been discontinued. Sorry!

Question 3:  From Jen King: “Any chance you might stock Pineapple Fanta in 2011?”

Response:  I would stock it if I could ever get it. I tried Fanta Pineapple while in Africa, and I loved it! I have been unable to find a source for it.

Question 4:  From Soo Hom: “Can you get Hires root beer?”

Response:  Hires Root Beer is not for sale in glass bottles at this time, so we do not carry it. Dr Pepper Snapple Group owns Hires, and it is reportedly still being produced in cans and/or plastic bottles, but reports online show that customers are having a hard time locating this soda, so it must have a limited distribution.

Question 5:  From Janet Brennan: “I was wondering what is your favorite soda from your childhood?”

Response:  Rondo, which is no longer made. My favorite childhood soda of those still being made is Pepsi.

Question 6:  From Albert Rapheal O'Neil: “whats your favorite type of ice cream?”

Response:  Mint Chocolate Chip

Question 7:  From Jared DePoppe: “Chuck whats it like being named Chuck?”

Response:  I don’t know too many Chucks, so it’s kinda unique and different. As a kid, I thought I was the only Chuck in the whole world.

Question 8:  From Jeff Trombly: “Do you have Pop Shoppe?”

Response:  We do carry Pop Shoppe Pineapple and Pop Shoppe Grape: I have tried to order more Pop Shoppe flavors, but they are not available to us at this time. If more flavors become available, I will bring them in.

Question 9:  From Bill Jensen: “wut made u invent this soda?”

Response:  Good question, but we actually do not invent or make this soda ourselves – we just find it and bring it to our store to sell.

Question 10:  From Justin Wilcox: “i think there should be 70s through 90's toys”

Response:  Thanks for the suggestion – what exactly are you thinking? Do you have specific toys in mind, or do you mean we should have a category for each decade and then list the toys from that decade?

Question 11:  From Rachel Paulus: “any chance of getting caffeine free dr pepper from you guys?”

Response:  I have never found that in glass bottles, so we do not carry it. Sorry!

Question 12:  From Holly Lynn Merrill-Hilton: "do you have a blue cream soda?”

Response:  Yes, we have several blue cream sodas: Dad’s Blue Cream, Frostie Blue Cream Soda, Jack Black’s Blue Cream Soda, and Moxie Blue Cream.

Question 13:  From Eric Larson: “Have you heard of the soda "Kentucky Nip"? … I am looking for a place to buy it again.”

Response:  Unfortunately, Kentucky Nip has been discontinued for some time. However, Sioux City Cherries ‘n Mint is the “new” Kentucky Nip because it has been formulated to taste exactly like Kentucky Nip. We normally carry this soda, but it happens to be out-of-stock right now.

Question 14:  From Bonnie St. Denis: “are any of your ginger ales/ginger beers the 'hot&spicy' variety?”

Response:  Yes, we have Pangleheimers Ginger Ale, Reed’s Extra Ginger Brew, Sprecher Ginger Ale, and Vernors Ginger Soda.

Question 15:  From Katie Kelly: “what's the most rewarding thing about your job?”

Response:  The most rewarding part is hearing the comment “Oh my goodness, I haven’t seen this since I was a kid” and seeing a smile on one of our customer’s faces. When this happens, I know that I helped give someone a few seconds of remembering a time when life was not so complicated. I love seeing the joy on peoples’ faces.

Question 16:  From Rebecca B: “have you guys looked into having a New Jersey location?”

Response:  We actually get a lot of suggestions for cities to open a new location in, but for now we are happy staying in Sabin and having our online store.

Question 17:  From Maria Harsh: “What made you decide to open the general store?”

Response:  I decided to open Old 52 as a service to the community: as a small town, Sabin does not have its own grocery store. For any real shopping, Sabin residents had to spend an hour our of their day (20 minutes driving to the nearest store, 20 minutes shopping, and 20 minutes driving home). I had the idea to open a local general store where people could pick up groceries, basic hardware items, etc. I surveyed the community to see if they would support such a store, and the response was encouraging, so I went ahead with the idea. Then I decided to try to find a way to attract locals from the surrounding areas out to Sabin to visit our store: I brought in three flavors of glass-bottled soda (Dad’s Root Beer, Green River, and Bubble Up) and sold those off our counter. The response was great, so we started bringing in more and more retro items, and the rest is history.

Question 18:  From Brittany Lee Akin: “Would you say that it's an overall rewarding business to own a general store? What are some things that reminds you every day why you have the job you have”

Response:  Owning Old 52 is very rewarding because it offers a chance for me to bring joy to our customers (see response to Question 15 above). It also gives me a chance to serve the community by offering a local store where they can find grocery items they need or hardware supplies that they would otherwise have to drive upwards of 20 minutes one way to purchase. Another thing that reminds me why I have this job is the fact that I love the variety – this business changes every day, there is always something new coming across my desk, and that keeps it interesting.

Question 19:  From Philip Cannon: “Do you ship? I need FAYGO cola real bad nowadays”

Response:  We do ship all of our sodas - you can order online at shopOld52.com. Since we specialize in glass-bottled sodas, we only carry the varieties of Faygo that are offered in glass bottles. Unfortunately, Faygo Cola is not one of these - we do carry Faygo Orange, Grape, Rock & Rye, Red Pop, Vanilla Creme, and Root Beer.

Question 20:  From Tom Gould: “how do you guys go about finding all the product that you stock in the store?”

Response:  We find new products based on peoples’ requests, internet searches, browsing blogs, and traveling and seeing other sodas. When someone requests a new soda, we search to see if the soda is being made, and, if it is, we try to find out if we are able to order some of the product for our store.

Question 21:  From Jeri Griffin Buboltz: “One of my favorite sweet treats from my childhood was foil-wrapped, chocolate candy cigarettes. … If you could locate them and start carrying them in your store, I would certainly buy a bunch!”

Response:  I don’t believe foil-wrapped chocolate candy cigarettes are being made anymore. We do carry Chocolate Candy Cigarettes wrapped in white paper that may have a similar taste to those you remember from your childhood.

Question 22:  From Jerry Calhoun: “My only suggestion is you need to do something to lower the shipping costs.”

Response:  (This response is from Jess and was originally posted on Facebook) Thanks for the comment to Chuck, Jerry, I can actually answer this one myself because I get asked it a lot. Unfortunately, our shipping costs are as low as they can be at this time (the only way they would go down is if UPS lowers their rates, which I do not think would happen). There are a few reasons that shipping costs are what they are for our products:

(i)      Glass-bottled soda is heavy. It has 12-16oz of liquid inside, plus the glass itself. Add that to our packaging, and you equal anywhere between 1.5-2lbs/bottle (a typical box of 12 sodas weighs in at 18-20lbs, more for the 16oz sodas). This automatically drives up the cost.

(ii)    We cannot use any of the priority or flat-rate boxes because they do not allow for the type of protective packaging we need to get our glass bottles to you in one piece. We use custom styrofoam holders to keep the bottles cushioned during shipment, and this is the only way we have found to fully protect the items from breaking. This does increase the size of the box required as well as slightly increasing the weight (which all drives up shipping costs), but it results in a very low rate of breakage as opposed to bubble wrap or other shipping methods.

(iii)    To determine shipping costs, each item you add to your cart has a weight attached to it, the total weight is then calculated, and that weight is used to pull a shipping estimate from the UPS website based on current rates for the destination zip code. On top of the UPS quote, there is a very small charge added for packing materials and labor, but that charge is minimal.

(iv)   I hope you understand that I (we) understand your question and concern about the shipping costs, and that is why I try to fully explain these details to anyone that asks. It's unfortunate that shipping is so expensive, but that's just the nature of shipping heavy, extremely fragile objects. Also, please note that we do not add on charges to make a profit on shipping - on larger orders we actually typically end up under-charging the customer for shipping vs what we actually pay to UPS.

Question 23:  From Shelley Thompson Wells: “What made you start up the General Store? Is this always been your career, or did you do something else before opening the Store?”

Response:  See my response to Question 17 above for what made me start Old 52. In addition to Old 52 (and before Old 52), I am the President of MAC’S Inc., which is the company of the MAC’S Hardware stores, 11 stores located across the tri-state area of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Minnesota. The corporate office for MAC’S is located in Moorhead, Minnesota, which is just a five minute drive from Old 52 in Sabin. As a resident of Sabin, I wanted to serve the community by opening the general store as a local source for groceries, hardware, etc., and the retro aspect of that evolved over time as a way to draw people from the surrounding areas to come visit Old 52 in Sabin.

Question 24:  From Dave Basey: “i believe you should consider a northern michigan location. You should stock more jones flavors.”

Response:  Thanks for the suggestions. As was said to Rebecca B above, we get a lot of suggestions for cities to open a new location in, but for now we are happy staying in Sabin and having our online store. As for the Jones flavors, we are currently carrying all of the Jones flavors that our vendors carry, but I will keep an eye out for new flavors the next time we order.

Question 25:  From Sherry Walker: “what are your favor sodas and candies?”

Response:  My favorite sodas are NuGrape, SunCrest Orange (this is the only soda that I prefer to drink warm, not cold), Moxie Orange Cream, and Point Root Beer. My favorite candies are Broadway Rolls, Chiclets, and Aero Mint Bars.

This is only about half of the questions asked during the contest – stay tuned for another blog post with more questions and answers!

*UPDATE*

The 2nd part of this blog post has been published and can be viewed here