360 Resale ready for business
By bob okon bokon@stmedianetwork.com April 12, 2012 11:22PM
Gary Talmadge (left) and Jane Micek are set to open their 360 Resale shop in Joliet on Friday, April 13, 2012. | Brett Roseman~Sun-Times Media
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Updated: May 14, 2012 8:10AM
JOLIET — A resale shop that overcame opposition from nonprofit groups to get city zoning opens Friday.
Co-owner Gary Talmadge got the zoning in December in part by arguing that his store really does not duplicate the resale businesses run by Habitat for Humanity and MorningStar Mission, which ended up withdrawing their opposition. Now, he has a chance to prove it.
360 Resale opens at 11 a.m. at 2625 W. Jefferson St. in the Stadium Plaza in Joliet.
Talmadge and business partner Jane Micek offered a look at the store on Wednesday.
“This is the man’s cave,” Talmadge said, showing one of the five rooms that he and Micek created in the store.
Some of the fun stuff in the man’s cave includes a slot machine, a skill crane and a bowling machine — the kind once common in neighborhood taverns.
The man cave has been particularly popular among workers getting the store ready for the opening, and not just men enjoy it, Micek said.
“All the workers who come here want to play — men and women,” she said. "Everyone plays the bowling. Everyone plays the slot machine,”
Talmadge and Micek have been buying this stuff — furniture, retro items, antiques, artwork, and assorted knickknacks — in a variety of ways. They go to auctions. They go to estate sales. They even buy from people with big houses overloaded with furniture.
“They’ve got expensive furniture that they’re not using,” Talmadge said. “They don’t want to donate it. They want money.”
This is one of the ways Talmadge argues that 360 Resale is different from the stores run by nonprofits. They’re not taking donations. He and Micek seek out items that they believe they can buy at a bargain and sell at a profit.
Talmadge pointed to a unique, crafted pillow that he said is priced at $250 online. He’s selling it for $98 but got it for much less in a visit to a resale store.
“They didn’t know what they had,” he said. And, the same could be true of some of the items that he’s selling. “I’m sure there’s stuff here we don’t know about,” Talmadge said.
It could be. This is their first venture into retail, although they want to open more stores like the one in Joliet. They’re working on one in Schaumburg now.
