“There’s never anything in here” the cleaners sighed,
peering exasperated into the janitor’s closet. “We told them they needed supplies three weeks ago.
People can’t even dry their hands and we
can’t stock what we don’t have”. Meanwhile, up at the front office complaints continued to pour in.
“There’s no towels in the bathroom”, said
one. “The dispenser at the other end of
the building is broken again” said another.
Finally, the granddaddy of them all, “we’re out of toilet paper!”
“What to do?” cried the poor secretary. Office stores were a rip off.
The big janitorial supply houses wanted you
to set up an account and required huge orders. Hence, an opportunity was born.
Seeing a need in the marketplace, Burke Hutcheson started
Janistore in the spring of 2002. Previously the owner of a commercial cleaning company, he knew many
customers had supply needs that weren’t being met.
In March of that year he started selling paper and
janitorial supplies almost literally out of the back of his trunk.
Actually he had a small one room office in
Durham and a garage sized self-storage unit about a mile away that served as
his ‘warehouse”.
“I was chief, cook and bottle washer in those days for
sure”, says Mr. Hutcheson. “I was our
company’s only sales rep. I was also the
warehouse manager and our delivery guy too”! “Thanks to our customers, we’ve come a long way”.
From humble beginnings, Janistore has grown to a state of
the art, full service janitorial supply house. We have gone against tired industry norms and instituted practices such
as: shop 24/7, no minimums, optional on line ordering, “How Much Is It” open
pricing for all, easy to read buying histories, product simplification and free
delivery, just to name a few.
Now with a beautiful showroom and warehouse in Hillsborough,
NC, we invite you to stop by anytime. Our storefront is open daily from 10AM-5PM Monday – Friday.
You can also call in after hours orders or shop
on line 24/7 by simply entering your customer number. If you don’t already have one, we’d be happy
to set one up for you. Most orders are
delivered the next day.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Burke Hutcheson
President
Janistore, Inc.