our biz: BUSINESS SENSE
Talk
with the
Business Titans
JUNE 2015
PA R K E R C O U N T Y T O D AY
Jim & Lori Perz
Proprietors, A Step Back ‘N Time
PCT: Why did you decide to open your antique businesses?
Lori: We have two locations, actually. We have an
antique store on York Avenue and another at the corner
of College and East Church, that’s our auction house and
antiques gallery.
The first was the York Avenue antique store. When we
started in the business I was working full-time in the
medical field, and (my husband) Jim opened up the
antique store. Once Jim got his auctioneer’s license, the
business grew so fast that I had to leave my job to work
in the family business.
Jim: Tell her why we really started the business. It was
because we were having yard sales and they were so
successful that we were having more and more of them.
Finally, the neighbors were getting mad at us and we
knew we couldn’t have any more yard sales. So, we rented a storefront and opened A Step Back In Time.
Lori: We’d buy storage units full of stuff and sell them
at yard sales. That was before Pawn Stars or any of those
reality shows were popular.
We both had our day jobs, at first. I was a medical assistant and he was a truck driver. It started out as something
we did for fun.
We would pay $100 for a storage unit of stuff and we
would make $4,000. But you do have to have an eye for
merchandise to do that. It’s not something everyone can
do. Our son oversees the store at 208 York Ave. Jim and I
focus on the location on the Weatherford Square.
PCT: What are some of your favorite antiques that you’ve
handled? Tell us the story behind them?
Jim: We purchased a 50-foot container of antiques from
Antwerp, Belgium —very expensive. My business partner
Rider Scott and I each paid half of the price.
The merchandise was phenomenal. We hand-picked
every piece that went onto the container from emailed
pictures.
It (the container) came in just before Christmas. We have
only a couple of pieces left in the store. They were all just
60
BY CHRISTINA LOVELESS
gorgeous.
Lori: That merchandise was so ornate, hand-carved. It
was just beautiful.
The exporters had bought a castle and the contents were
what we got to choose from.
Jim: It was so expensive. … It was scary, because we
were spending thousands and thousands of dollars and
prayed that it would get here in the end.
But it was worth it because the merchandise was of a
certain quality and our customers were thrilled to have
access to it.
We didn’t know the guy we were dealing with. I only
talked to him on the phone once and communicated via
email. So let’s say we put out $50,000, and all we had
were emails.
We were praying that we would turn the corner and there
would be a truck full of the antiques we bought. We were
driving to our store. We turned the corner… and there it
was.
PCT: How did you end up at the old Cotten-Bratton
Funeral Home/Furniture Store?
Jim: Well I was looking for a bigger location, somewhere
we could have auctions. And I called Rider (Scott – the
funeral home had been in his family for more than a
century) and told him I was interested in the building.
Rider … wanted to talk to me over a coffee. So we met
and that is how our relationship started. I talked to him
about a business plan. It took a few months, but it worked
out. We opened in this location (on the Square) in 2012.
So we are a tight-knit group. Rider is a really good person
to do business with. He is very “old school.” If he gives
his word and a handshake, it’s written in stone.
Lori: This is the oldest building on this whole Square.
We love how much tradition is tied to this building.
We’ve had people come in and say, “Forty years ago
we got married and then we came in here and needed a
bedroom set. We bought one here and we still have it.
She gave us our little card, and we just paid two dollars a
week.”