CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A Charleston shopping institution celebrate a centennial in business this weekend. The Charleston Department Store will celebrate being in business 100 years on Saturday.
“My grandfather started the business as an immigrant from Russian in 1921. My father took it over after World War II. I came back and got involved in the early 80’s and have been managing the store ever since,” said General Manager and Owner Barry Ogrin.
Through the year, generations of Kanawha Valley residents have shopped at the store. Ogrin acknowledged loyal customers and loyal staff have been the reason behind their success.
“Most retailers have trouble keeping employees, we have trouble getting rid of ours,” he laughed. “We have people that have been with us 30, 40, 50 years. It’s been terrific,” he said.
The retail clothing business has drastically changed as well during the 100 years. Many remember their mom taking them to the store on the West Side of Charleston for their back to school shopping. The store survived the changes brought on by the mall in the 1980’s and in the past decade, Ogrin said they were nimble and understood how to navigate around the transition people have made to internet shopping.
“We’re small enough we’re able to change focus and move quickly as trends change. We need to stop competing with the Amazon’s of the world, so we find niches we are really good at,” he said.
One of those niches has been medical scrubs. Ogrin said in the past five years the business has grown exponentially. The pandemic only increased their scrub business. The store also specializes in Big and Tall items and it’s a magnet for blue collar workers looking for a strong variety of work clothes and boots.
The store, located at the corner of West Washington and Patrick Street hasn’t always been there. The store originally was up the street a little. Ogrin’s father owned the current location and built the store in the early 1970’s as a 20,000 square foot warehouse which could be rented out as warehouse space if the retail store didn’t work out.
“We’ve been here ever since,” he said.
This Saturday, they’ll celebrate with a big tent sale. There will also be chances for customers to drawn and get anywhere from 5 to 50 percent off their entire order. Mountain Mission will also be holding a hot dog sale as part of the event and 100 percent of those sales proceeds will go toward helping feed the hungry in the city’s west side.