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signed on the dotted line May 31,
Becki recalled, and by June 1, she
and Jack were running the store on
their own.
Previously, Jack Smith had been
a building contractor while work-
ing at the paper mill, which had
then been Verso. After acquiring
Anderson Lumber Co., he stopped
bidding on jobs so as not to com-
pete with customers.
Though the business started under
the Smiths with a bang, difficul-
ties arose soon after. There were
extreme price fluctuations and
unavailability of materials.
“There was just so much that
changed in the industry so fast that
the previous owners couldn’t even
really guide us,” Becki said.
It was a new landscape; the
Andersons’ experiences had been
different. New logistics were in
order.
The Smiths traveled to navigate
the sparse supply chain. Though
materials were hard to come by,
they didn’t want to leave their new
customers hanging.
“We would literally hop in our
own truck with a trailer and drive
to Wisconsin, sometimes as far as
Chippewa Falls, just to get the
material we needed,” Becki said.
The people who chose to hold off
on major projects were then faced
with a jump in interest rates.
Now, after five years, business
is approaching what she hopes is
“normal.”
After two years, in 2022, they
finally changed the name from
Anderson Lumber Co. to Smith
& Sons Lumber Co. to reflect
to the community that there had
been a change in ownership. Some
customers hadn’t realized the
Andersons no longer ran the place,
as there hadn’t been many visible
changes when the Smiths came in.
Updating systems had been the
big thing. Becki said continual
small projects contributing to an
overall facelift of the place may
occur in the near future.
People appreciate the old-school
charm of the store, which is a
full building center and hardware
supplier, at the end of South Main
Street. Smith & Sons is one of the
few places that sells bulk nails by
weight, rather than in prepackaged
amounts.
But it’s really the customer ser-
vice, the knowledge of its staff,
and the quality lumber — never
“economy” wood — that sets
Smith & Sons apart, Becki said.
Because they know they have
other stores to compete with,
Smith & Sons takes pride in doing
what they can for the people who
choose to shop with them.
“Being small and having multi-
ple competitors very close by…
we really, really have to focus on
the customer service, and we try
to keep our delivery fees reason-
able,” Becki said.
Typically, delivery range is
within an hour — they travel to
Garden, Cooks, Manistique, Tre-
nary, Bark River — but have also
gone farther, she said.
The other leg up Smith & Sons
has is knowledge.
Jack had been a building con-
tractor, and currently, he’s the
building and zoning administrator
for Delta County. One salesman
has worked in the industry for
over 30 years, another salesman
had been a contractor for decades.
The Smith sons, Jack and Becki’s
boys who also work in the lumber
yard and drive deliveries, used to
help their father build and have
grown up in that environment.
Bookkeeper JoLee has been with
the company since the Ander-
Great Lakes Logging • Expo Edition 2025
sons owned it; she is part of that
family.
Customers who frequent Smith
& Sons Lumber Co. are varied,
but there are a few types. There
are local regulars, who come in
frequently for small odd jobs.
There are the seasonals — people
who live elsewhere the rest of the
year but return in the summers
and find work to be done on their
U.P. abodes. And then there are
the building contractors.
“One of our goals was to bring
on more contractors,” Becki said,
“and we have at least doubled our
contractors, if not more.”
Plus, of course, there is the spo-
radic newcomer, discovering the
shop and stopping in for supplies.
Something new that Smith &
Sons has brought in just with-
in the last few months are the
DAKA docks — roll-in, sectional
and floating docks. There’s one
out front of the lumberyard as a
display, and Becki said people
have come in to get a quote or to
purchase one at least once a week.
Located at 10293 S. Main St.
in Rapid River, Smith & Sons
Lumber Co. is open from 8 a.m.
to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday
and 8 a.m. to noon on Saturday.
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