Elgin's Bargain Box Surpasses $250,000 In Revenue

A simple idea for a retirement pastime has turned into more than a quarter of a million dollars in revenue recently for an Elgin business.

The Elgin Bargain Box recently topped $250,000 since starting in 2014, and its donations are closing in on $200,000.

Linda Kerkman said that the business started when she was looking for a way to give back after retirement.

“I retired, and didn’t have enough to do. I needed a group of people to work with. I was a long term care nurse and I worked at various volunteer things, but it wasn’t enough,” she said.

Kerkman said the idea for the store came from the success of a similar business in Pender.

“I ran into an article from the Norfolk paper- March 12, 2014 - and Pender had taken a little garage place (and converted it) and had already made $10,000,” she said.

The Blair Motors building in Elgin had went through multiple uses after the dealership closed its doors. They took over in the fall of 2014 and worked to make the building ready for the business.

“August 1st we took over the building, and we cleaned and worked our tails off to get it ready,” she said.

The Bargain Box was met with open arms by the Elgin community, and Kerkman said that they have kept them stocked up on everything.

“The community has embraced us so much that we have never run out of inventory.”

Donations are constantly flowing into the Bargain Box, and new items are set out every day. Kerkman said that the business has sparked generosity from many in the community.

“It has brought about a spirit of generosity in the city of Elgin. I think that when people see generosity, they feel in a greater capacity that they can be generous like that,” she said.

Because of the overwhelming amount of donations, especially with clothing, not all can be set out. To make sure they still go to good use, the volunteers box up clothing separated by gender, season, and size and donate them to the Orphan Grain Train. The Bargain Box has sent more than 2,500 boxes of clothing to the Orphan Grain Train since they started.

The Bargain Box Board is made up of Linda Kerkman, Linda Eischeid, Barb Finn, Margaret Hensley and Sandy Kerkman. Without them, Kerkman said, the Bargain Box would have never achieved this success.

“This whole operation would not be possible without my fellow board members and volunteers.”

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