Drew Callahan checks inventory at Callahan’s Family Discount Warehouse in Hudson Falls,
which he owns with his wife, Sarah. The company sells overstocked items from Walmart.
BY JILL NAGY
Callahan’s Family Discount Warehouse in
Hudson Falls is part bargain basement and part
charitable institution.
The store sells returns and overstocks from
Walmart and other big box stores at discounted
prices, with 10 percent of the profits going to
the Open Door Mission in Glens Falls. They also
sell donated clothing–no item priced above
$3–with 25 percent of the receipts going to the
Mission.
The Open Door Mission “is something my
wife and I believe in,” said Drew Callahan, who
owns the business along with his wife, Sarah.
They learned of the Mission through their church,
Cornerstone Bible Church in Fort Ann, and have
been involved with it since buying the Family
Discount Warehouse business in July.
“We don’t have the time to give them,” he noted,
so they contribute money. Their contributions
were acknowledged at a recent donor banquet,
which Callahan found “very cool, very humbling,
actually.”
Part of the reason the Callahans are too busy
to actively participate in the work of the Open
Door Mission is that “in the past year, we bought
a business, had a child and began to build a yurt,”
he said. They are building the yurt, a round building
of Mongolian antecedents, which will be their
home, in South Bay Village, near Fort Ann. In
addition, the Callahans own Travel Well, a “bohemian
style boutique” in the Shirt Factory in Glens Falls.
The businesses are family-run. Callahan’s
mother runs the Glens Falls gift shop, with Sarah
helping out. The four employees at the Family
Discount Warehouse include Sarah’s mother.
The Callahans worked for the former owner
of the store, who called it Webitamerica. It began
as an online store, with similar stock, and then
expanded to a brick and mortar store. The building
began as a garage for large trucks and then as
a warehouse for the online business, according to
manager Sean Smith.
The business buys goods by the truckload from
return centers as well as overstocks, and goods in
damaged boxes. Most of the goods are carefully
inspected before they go in the shelves, Callahan
said, and those that have not been inspected are
labelled as such–and can be returned. Goods have
color-coded price tags that tell customers what is
used, what is damaged or missing parts, and what
has not been inspected.
In the future, there may be some special sales
and “we will try to pack the store right up to the
gills” with goods for the holidays, Callahan said.
Callahan’s Family Discount Warehouse is
located at 56 North St. in Hudson Falls. The store
is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through
Friday; 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday.
The telephone number is 338-3199.