Joe Shenton and James Pulllen run the new store which people are travelling miles to visit
Two old school mates have brought a unique store to a Merseyside town. Joe Shenton and James Pulllen, both 24, opened up the third branch of Joseph James Furniture a few weeks ago.
The pair have transformed the old Wilko on 1 Cotham Street in St Helens town centre into a huge new furniture store. They have claimed Joseph James stores are the “TK Maxx of furniture”.
When asked to explain why he chose this description, Joe told the ECHO: “I think that's just a simple way of explaining our model, which can be complicated and not familiar to everyone.
“Obviously, many people are aware of the TK Maxx model of essentially receiving branded fashion items - clothes, bags and whatnot - and then selling them cheaper than the recommended retail price.
“That's very similar to what we do. We receive the stock for very similar reasons - end of line stuff, canceled orders, excess stock. It’s very similar, but we do it for furniture.
“Some furniture outlets are just selling cheap furniture that's imported from abroad. I want to make it really clear that we're selling authentic stuff cheaper, not just cheaper stuff that anyone could get.”
The idea originated when the two friends finished school. Joe said: “We left at 18 and both embarked on a gap year. We actually went to auction houses and just looked for stuff to flip - smaller things, easier things you could put in your car and take home, like microwaves.
“But whilst we were at one of these auctions, I heard the knocking of the gavel going on nearby. It was a live auction so we went over to have a look and it turns out they were auctioning furniture, mainly sofas.
“I had a quick look at the tags on the sofas. I Googled the brand of one sofa. It was going for about £100, but it was retailing online for about £800. I could see there was some money to be made there.
“So we bought a couple of items, got a man in a van, took them home and spruced them up. We took photos of them on an iPhone and mainly advertised on Facebook marketplace. Things really spiralled from there. I think we both put £2,000 in when we started back in late 2019. It went quite well, but it was definitely a risk at the time.”
Joe and James however began to find collecting items bought at auction a “nightmare” and to expand began reaching out to manufacturers, distributors and brands directly.
The friends, who are from south Manchester, opened their first stores in Stockport and Stretford respectively and saw a wave of new customers each time they opened.
Joe says finding the right place is the most challenging part of the business but the old Wilko store stood out to him. He said: “Our model doesn't work if we have to sell to much higher margins to pay to buy or rent a retail store, so we tend to be looking for disused buildings that have been on the market for at least a year.
“The building was the most important thing why I went for St Helens. It had its own onsite car parking, so we hope that can attract people from other Merseyside areas too.
“Whilst they had sold all the fixtures and fittings and it was quite a big refurb job, it was a one big flat floor rather than being over two floors, which was quite important to us. The size of the space was really good too.”
The store has only been open a few weeks but Joe says the reaction so far has been promising. He said: “I think people are very impressed. I think people enjoy the new carpet smell when they walk in and we've got lots positive feedback about the refurb. People also say it’s nice to have a building in the town that’s being used.
“The first few opening days were mainly people from St Helens but we’re starting to get customers from further afield like Liverpool and Wigan too.”
Joe claims he has little time to look back but is proud of what he and James have built. He said: “We do very different things really. We can probably go two weeks without actually seeing each other.
“But he focuses more on the buying and selling side of things, so he'll spend a lot of time on the shop floors training the sales staff and doing some selling himself. I focus on the suppliers we work with, the brands we work with and more of the marketing and administrative side of things.
