Core Values as Cornerstones

I love how our stores all embody the same Core Values, leading to a general culture of empowerment, fun, creativity and friendship; yet each store has its own style, its own take on that culture and how it embodies the Core Values. Each store team uses that empowerment to do their own thing, to better the experience for themselves and for our customers, in their own way.

If you work in a place with intentional culture, then this may still seem remarkable, but also understandable and even commonplace. However, if you have had experience with unintentional, unempowering or even negative company culture this might just blow your mind: The Willow Glen team decided to run this contest all on their own. It's not something the corporate team or the owner said to do. It's not something any of the other stores are doing. It's not something ACE suggested doing.

It's just a great idea that Willow Glen came up with on their own and implemented.  They made a raffle jar out of an old paint can (Innovation!), showcased some of our chalk paint, wrote our core values on the can and put it out there.

The thing that makes my heart sing about this is that at Hassett Hardware we know we have an entire company full of innovators and makers, and we act like it. I don't know the whole story behind how this particular great idea came into being, but my educated guess is that someone said to the store manager, "Hey, I think this would work," and the store manager probably said, "Great, let's try it." It's completely possible (and not unusual) that the person who thought of it may have just gone ahead and done it. 

We believe in each other and everybody knows it. What's the best thing that could happen? They try it. What's the worst thing that could happen? They try it. The best and worst are one in the same, because someone took an idea they had and implemented it. They experimented. They trusted themselves and the process and the fact that their idea was totally in line with the core values. Whether it works or not, is secondary. When the core values are used as the cornerstones for how we all act, we are each our own boss, navigating by a compass that always points in the right direction.

-Jocelyn Lovelle

Maker Faire 2012

A large congregation filled with explosive creativity, unique inventions, enthusiasm for knowledge, and countless fans certainly deserves an official event....maybe its own faire? Is it even possible to contain such diversity all in one place? Well of course! And congratulations if you guessed this event right because I am talking about the famous Maker's Faire; the perfect heaven for an invention junkie!

There are many reasons to attend such an event, and for those who have not had a chance, it is time to clear room on the calendar. Not only is this a perfect family attraction to attend, but it is also embedded with a dash of engineering fun and a pinch of science and technology. You can even learn how to pick a standard lock and solder together a ring! Inspiration is everywhere and those at the faire who had harnessed its capabilities really showed their success with flying colors.



Where else can you find a giant umbrella sculpture that whenever a listener of curiosity presses a button, flames shoot into the air with magnificent fury? Where else can you find two Teslas being fortified as a musical instrument while simultaneously sending out bolts of electricity onto a cage filled with enthusiastic children? Where else can you find motorized cup-cake cars manned by people zipping around in the crowd?

Whatever inspired the Making Warriors to create such oddities, it also helped foster the rebounding spirit of creating things by hand, not soullessly mass produced by machine. And that right there is the significant heart of what Maker's Faire is all about. Adam Savage applauded this current movement during his speech on the last day of the Faire. He used several stories from his “making” career as a foundation of encouragement to inspire listeners, especially children, to be resourceful and to take the pledge to create whatever they wanted. This pledge is meant to kick down any doors that would prevent someone from making, let's say, a giant, obnoxiously florescent, fabric covered, bike driven float that screams total awesomeness. Every single attendee in the faire had traveled to that event because somewhere, somehow, they have been touched by the magic of innovation. Not only can you learn from this innovation, you can also catch its fever and continue the making trend; from imagination, to engineering, and to production.

-Brianna Harbinson; All Images © Brianna Harbinson