TRURO - Arnold Hagen's life's dreams are being converted into high-definition technicolour.
Or at least they will when he finally reaches the point of a better balance between his work and family life.
In January 2011, at age 46, Hagen realized his lifelong dream of having his own business after leaving a career in the banking industry and purchasing Harris Home Hardware on Pictou Road.
Now, he is the owner of a second Home Hardware franchise after purchasing the building supply and hardware assets from the recently closed A.J. Walkers outlet and moving them into a refurbished location in the former Co-op store on Willow Street.
"It certainly wasn't a planned venture so early on," he said, during an interview this week. "This was just an opportunity I guess. If I didn't do this, there was a good opportunity somebody else would come along and want to do it."
Although the new store is still in the process of having its shelves fully stocked, the location is open for business, with service being offered by the majority of the staff from Walkers along with some new faces added into the mix.
In all, Hagen expects to start with about 24 employees with plans to expand that number to about 30 or so as business grows.
And he believes long-ime, loyal Walkers' customers will be happy with the new operation.
"With the merger of taking the Walkers element and merging it in with us coming to this location, I felt was a great fit," he said, adding that he will be offering the full plumbing lines previously provided by Walkers.
"That's one of the things that attracted me to this opportunity. Walkers had some real nice niche lines," he said. "Plumbing was certainly one of their bigger ones."
In addition to the plumbing line, Hagen said his new location will also be retaining other services that had been offered at Walkers, such as supplying and cutting flat and angle iron and pipe threading.
And, at some point, he expects to begin a service centre similar to what had also operated at Walkers.
"It is our intention over time to set up a service centre. But that's not going to happen right at the moment," he said.
But with 22,000 sq. ft. of retail space to work with - almost double that of the Pictou Road store - Hagen said customers will see increased variety and numbers of products on the store shelves.
"Larger footprint here so we have the opportunity for a greater ability to make displays and show off more of what Home Hardware really has to offer," including a larger kitchen display area, he said.
Since purchasing the Pictou Road location and realizing a life-long goal of running his own business, Hagen's personal expectations have been met "... and then some," he said.
And once things get to the point where he can build a bit more family time into his daily grind, life will be pretty much where he wants it to be.
"But outside of that," he said, in reference to his lack of home life, "I'm having the time of my life, quite frankly. This has been nothing short of a dream really. We're very pleased with how the business is going, very pleased with how the community is supporting us and I really have high hopes for this location. If we can retain the walker's business line and grow from there, I'll be very pleased."
