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(This interview has been edited for clarity and length.)
Q: Could you tell me a little bit about yourself and your family’s role running the store?
Melvin: I am co-owner of the Coburns’ General Store. My brother and I bought it together back in 1977. He’s retired, but I am still a half owner of the building and the business and everything. He is still involved a bit. He retired fully about four years ago and before that only worked a couple days a week. 25 years ago, my daughter came on to work when he went on semi-retirement. Since that time, my wife and I have basically run this store pretty much with my daughter. [It’s] been a great thing to own over the 47 years. I was thrilled when my brother came to me and asked me if I’d be willing to go in with him to buy this store. Kind of a lifelong dream for me.
Q: What was the store before you bought it?
Melvin: It was a general store. There was a family who owned it for like 33 years. Their last name was Varney. They sold it in 1973 to a local father and daughter. They had some tough times. It was pretty low-inventory and sales were down and people in town were hoping somebody would take over. But it’s back up the way it used to be when Varney’s owned it for so many years. It’s sort of been a general store since 1885. The owner built the main building here and owned it for a little more than 47 years. We actually broke the record for longest running general store in Strafford history last September by one day and now we keep adding to it. Every day we own it we keep adding to it and set a new record. I’ve told so many people it doesn’t seem like a job to me because I enjoy it so much.
Q: Were you and your brother already living in Strafford when the opportunity to buy the store came up?
Melvin: I’ve lived here all my life. My brother was in the service for a few years and then lived out of town for a while before he got married and came to town. Both of us were basically born and raised here.
Q: You’ve said you’ve loved working at the store and that it doesn’t feel like work every day, but have you always wanted to own a general store?
Melvin: Well, I guess owning a store would have somewhat been my dream. I didn’t think it would really happen. When I first got out of high school, I did some work for a food store in Hanover, New Hampshire. Then I went to work for the Postal Service in White River – that’s when my brother first approached me about buying this store here. When I was in the Postal Service, I had basically given up the idea of ever having my own store because I planned on retiring from the Post Office, and I think about that once in a while because I could have retired 20 years ago at the Post Office instead of continuing here [laughter]. But it’s been worthwhile, it’s been fun. When we bought the store, I didn’t expect to get rich. I just wanted to be able to make a comfortable living and we’ve been able to do that. We raised a couple of kids, we put them through college, my son went to the Coast Guard. It’s been a good life. A pretty good life and I’m not unhappy with any of it [smiles].
Q: What has been your favorite part of the job and being the owner?
Melvin: Customers. I’m a people-person. I love talking to people. I’m not what you call an extrovert by any means, but I do enjoy talking to people. People who have interviewed me before want to know what advice I’d have for the new owner. To me, you’ve got to love what you do and if you’re a people-person, enjoy working with the public, dealing with the public, that’s two of the biggest things you can have working in a general store. A general store is so important to every town. Unfortunately, a lot of towns are losing their little general stores, but we’ve been very fortunate, we’ve had good support from the town. And when you grow up in the town where you own the general store, you basically know like 95 percent of the people. But it’s just nice that you have that comradeship I guess with people that you’ve known all your life. That’s the best part to me. You know, I love stocking shelves, but I also love talking to people as they come in. We have a lot of fun in here, we really do.
Q: How important is it for people in a rural place like South Strafford to be able to come to the store and see people they know while also shopping for their basic groceries?
Melvin: I think probably the majority of people really enjoy coming here. It’s an information center really. When babies are born, the parents or grandparents will put a post an announcement by the register so people know about it. If anybody dies, people in town are always supporting that family, they’ll take food to them and everything. But everybody comes in here to find out what’s going on, you know? We have something probably going on almost at least one Saturday every month. It’s kind of a town-wide thing, but this is kind of the hub, I guess. For instance, if the electricity goes out, the phone will ring constantly with people wanting to know if we know when the power is going to come back on. It’s really the heart of the community. There’s no question about it. When we said we were going to put it up for sale immediately everyone came in and said, “Oh my God, you’re not going to close the store, are you?”
Q: What do general stores like yours provide to a community that a chain store doesn’t?
Melvin: I think it is just the community aspect of it, really. We’re really more community-oriented than they are. People in country towns just like their general store to be run by somebody that they know, that they’re comfortable with. I think it is very important to people – I mean, it would be to me if I didn’t own the store. Whoever buys the store, I’m hoping they won’t make too many changes.
Q: If Coburns’ General Store wasn’t open, how far would residents of South Strafford have to travel to get their groceries?
Melvin: The closest place would be Lebanon, over in New Hampshire which is about 20 miles. It’s quite a long distance. You know we don’t have too many people here that do all their shopping here, but if you need a quart of milk or a pound of hamburger, you don’t have to travel 20 miles just to get it. It’s such an important asset to the community.
Q: Do you have any favorite memories or stories of your time here in the store?
Melvin: Well, my wife always tells one: I’m on one of Noah Kahan’s Songs – The View Between Villages, the extended version – he interviewed me once and I got a few words on one of his songs. I was here one day and Sue, my wife, was here and these two young girls came in. I don’t remember what state they were from but they got talking to Sue about Noah Kahan and they said, “There’s a man on one of his songs that supposedly lives here.” And Sue said, “Yeah, I know him.” And they said, “You do?” And she said, “Yeah, would you like to meet him?” and she hollered to me and I went out and it was just – it was just so much fun. They were thrilled to death to meet somebody – I just grew up here, an old country boy, that’s all I am. But because of being on the song, they think I’m some great person, you know? Somebody said to Sue one day, “It’s going to his head” and she said, “Yes, it is” [Smiles.] I enjoy it, it’s a lot of fun and I’m still the same person I was 47 years ago when we bought the store.
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