(gentle chiming) - [Announcer] Funding for "Working Capital" is provided by the "Friends of KTWU" and "Go Topeka".

(upbeat music) - Welcome back to "Working Capital".

Today we're kind of at a retro crossroads, is what I'd call it for Topeka, 10th and Macvicar, where everyone's seen Bobo for years, but now we get kind of another, what I would say throwback, but really it's so timely for today even because of how cool it is.

"Dee and Me Hobbies", they've been around Topeka for over 40 years.

They've been in a few locations.

They're on a new owner from, well I shouldn't say new, 15 years, someone with a lot of passion for this place.

But today we have Rich Zeller from "Dee and Me Hobbies".

Thank you for being on the show, Rich.

- Thank you, Jay.

- This place is fantastic.

Well, in a little bit we'll get to this new space, but first I want to, you weren't the original owner here so - Mm-hmm.

- how did you get attracted to this hobby in general and then wanna make a career out of it?

- Well, I'm the third owner of "Dee & Me Hobbies" and the first owner, Dwayne Eberhart, started this in the mid '80s down on Kansas Avenue.

And when I went in there at 12 years old, I was blown away on all these amazing cool RC cars, airplanes, and just fell in love with the stuff.

And over time, you know, your career path comes, my father says do something you enjoy.

It makes work life better.

And I ended up pursuing the hobby shop career.

- But did your dad agree with that choice as a do what you love?

- Absolutely.

- Right off the bat?

- He's probably the one that was taking you at 12 years old to the hobby shop.

- Absolutely.

Dad and mom were very supportive of my hobbies, you know, back in the '80s, we just played outside all the time.

And nothing better than a cool RC car or an airplane to enjoy when you're outside.

- Did you start with models or anything else?

How did your dad decide, let's kind of push you towards this direction?

- I think it was my interest.

I went into a store and just saw that these cars were bigger, more powerful than the stuff Radio Shack sold and it kind of caught my attention.

And back then you'd get magazines mailed to you and they'd talk about these cool cars that you could not find in Wal-Marts or K-Marts back in the day and discovered you had to build them from scratch before you even could enjoy 'em.

Nowadays the hobbies move to they come ready to run versus having to assemble it before you enjoy it, so the hobby's come a long way.

But the speed and the fun factor is always just right up there with one of the more fun things to do in life.

- So 40 years ago, a gentleman, Mr. Eberhart, - Mm-hmm.

- has his vision and he starts selling out of his garage.

- That is correct.

- And I think you told me it took about a year til he realized he really had something.

- Yep.

- So tell us just a little bit of the progression of that first on Kansas Avenue and where the business kind of grew as you saw it growing up even to then where you took it over and where we're at now.

- So Dwayne had the store in Kansas and then after about five to eight years, he moved it to White Lakes Mall, if people still remember that place.

- Oh yeah.

- He was there for about eight years at White Lakes Mall and then he made the move to Fairlawn Plaza, where "Dee & Me Hobby" spent the last 25 years at Fairlawn Plaza, couple different locations inside Fairlawn Plaza, but eventually we grew to the point where we just needed our own standalone store where more room for activities, and that's where a year ago we pursued this location.

- So for over, oh, so it's been in planning for a while now?

- Yes, yes.

- So when you're deciding to do the move, how do you finally decide this is the stop date, was it more of a my lease is up?

- Well, so I knew that the location we were in didn't have the room necessary for us to continue to grow and expand.

And so my coworker Earl, who does a great job as my manager, suggested that we find our own building.

And it's always been in the back of my mind, but at that point I knew that was the direction we needed to go because we had outgrown our current location.

So I started pursuing, looking for a good location within a price point that I could afford.

- Yeah.

- And came across this place and with a little bit of sweat equity, we turned it into what it is today.

- Talking about sweat equity, a lot of our business owners, they are, you know, self-made businesses, not franchises or anything.

So how much did you have to pour into this of your own?

How long did it take you to make this viable to get your product in here?

- Well, me and Andy, who's helping a customer currently, came here once a day for almost a year working on this store for about eight hours a day.

But then we had customers ask if they could join us free of charge.

And a guy named Rich Carpenter was very supportive and a great help.

And him and Andy had the carpentry stuff that I lacked and they sheetrocked, they painted, we did all these lights, changed them from the old fluorescent lights to the modern LEDs.

All that we did ourselves.

Obviously had a floor put in, a new roof, all this stuff to make the building almost like new.

- So really your customers, because of what you're doing here and kind of the niche, they really do become family then 'cause not a lot of places you get your clientele, "Oh, you're moving the restaurant to a new place.

"Let me come help you with your HVAC."

- Jay, we moved a month ago and when we knew we were moving, we started asking people if they'd like to help us.

We're gonna move on Monday, September 1st, Labor Day.

Please come and help if you'd like.

Over 40 people showed up for free help.

We moved the store of over 10,000 items in eight hours.

- That is fan- - In one day.

And it was all due to the help of the customers that regularly shop with us all came in and pitched in, gave us six hours of their time.

Brought in several enclosed trailers and just seven trips, and we made it in seven trips.

And then it took a week to obviously rearrange and hang stuff up.

- Find the flow of how you can do everything.

- Exactly.

Exactly.

- But like you said, over 10,000 items in the store.

- Mm-mm.

- You were telling me before when we first got here, you know, you really needed the space 'cause if you don't have it on the shelf, you can't make that sale.

- [Rich] Yes.

- And talk to me a little bit about these brick and mortar stores like yours who are competing with, your biggest competitor is probably gonna be Amazon or someone online for this, but they wouldn't have the expertise.

- That is correct.

So in today's world, it's very easy to pull out your smartphone, tablet, and order some cool stuff online.

But people still like to go and see it, touch it.

And we're a destination store where you wanna come in and you might only spend $5 on a piece of, you know, some glue or some paint, but you enjoy the atmosphere walking around, looking at maybe your next purchase in the future.

And you can't really do that online.

Or sometimes we have lots of demo models so you can see 'em run.

- Yeah.

- You know, you can touch 'em, feel 'em.

And that's an experience you only get in a brick and mortar and brick and mortars at one point were obviously dying off, but they have definitely made a comeback 'cause a lot of owners know you need to make your store a destination store.

- Yeah.

- Make it fun for the customer to come in, see the product, touch the product.

- Yep.

I mean, like I say, it's a touch point.

It's bright, vivid colors.

You'd have to be having a really, really bad day to walk in here and not smile.

Like I do enjoy looking through and seeing the RC cars online and stuff going on but when you walk in and you can see it and go pick it up and be like, "Oh my god", you get a little, you get happy.

- Absolutely.

- So I mean you guys are kind of selling happiness here.

It's hobbies but with the family aspect and that's pretty amazing.

So when we get back we'll learn more about "Dee & Me Hobbies" so stick around.

You're watching "Working Capital".

- [Announcer] To watch more episodes of "Working Capital" or any of your other favorite KTWU shows, type in www.watch.ktwu.org or scan the QR code.

- Welcome back to "Working Capital".

Now you're gonna see why I cannot get a job at "Dee & Me Hobby", but here is some of the crew here.

So Rich, tell us who's with us and tell us a little bit about their specialties here at the store.

- Okay, I'm gonna start with Earl here on my left.

Earl's been working with us for over eight years.

He's currently the manager of "Dee & Me Hobbies".

He helps keep everything organized, all the new products that come out.

He brings it to my attention, make sure, you know, we talk about how much we wanna order and he also keeps everything organized really well.

Very much needed.

And then Andy here to my right, he's our airplane expert and he helps teach people how to fly these cool airplanes.

Gives great advice if you need how to program these computer radios.

He's the guy to talk to.

And between the three of us we hope to cover as many hobby needs as one, questions people may have or help they may need.

- Who's the biggest kid here?

- Probably the owner, Rich.

- All right, all right.

So this is kind of cool though because we talked about earlier, people will go to Amazon, they buy something, they get home, they crash it, they wreck it, they don't how to put it together, maybe they wire it wrong.

You guys, your team here, you can start from the beginning and start from a nice starter set from pretty much any of the lines you have here and get some kind of expertise to make you feel comfortable at with it at home.

So let's first just start off like if you want to get into this kind of hobby, like you were telling me about this kind of car.

You know, you talk about grandmas coming in and needing to buy for the grandkids and yeah, you can't spend $400 or $500 starter sets for all your grandkids.

So tell us why this is such a better product than say going to Wal-Mart and just getting something off the shelf.

- Well, replacement parts.

For one kids are rough with things.

They like to go fast and these have better performance.

But if anything breaks all the parts are in stock here at "Dee & Me Hobbies".

So you just stop on by and if you feel comfortable fixing it yourself it's a $5 part and you're up and running again.

If you want we can have Andy or Earl throw it together for you for only a $5 or $10 quick little labor charge.

We'll be glad to do it for you.

- Do you ever have people just start doing their own repairs on your stands - Yes.

- and then like, "Hey what about this?"

- Jay, that's a great point.

So at the old store it used to be done on these glass cases and it sometimes would just, it'd be difficult to conduct business when you've got people repairing on the glass cases.

- Yeah.

- So at the new store we've got a couple tables we built specifically for that.

- Oh, that's awesome.

- So we can have a customer just put their stuff on a table, work, we'll even loan 'em the tools and you know, we'll look over their shoulder and guide 'em if they ever get stuck.

- That's fantastic.

So we're gonna come back to the cars also, but let's talk a bit about planes because that's another huge section here.

As you walk in you see some pretty big models.

So I know you can come, start small, go big.

Tell me how you got into that and tell me what would you suggest if someone walked in off the street, how do you get started flying these days?

- Well, you start by buying a basic beginner airplane and getting some lessons.

- How resilient are those?

Because I know if I got one I'm gonna crash it 30 seconds after I take off the first time.

- Well.

- I mean, is it something where I should plan - That's why you'd- - for spare parts the first time out?

- Well, no.

- No?

- You should plan to have someone help you.

- Yeah.

- That way you don't crash.

- But there are clubs in Topeka too.

- Oh yeah.

- So I know a lot of you are members, and I think even you are part of a flying club.

- I'm the president of the Northeast Kansas Blue Sky Squadron.

- Oh right on.

- We are actually a giant scale club.

We fly giant scale.

- So I'm gonna show you a picture, but right above us you can see a pretty big, I mean it's bigger than me for sure.

These guys may be taller than it.

- But we bring members in.

- Yeah.

- You know, if someone comes in, buys a plane, we say, come on down, we'll teach you how to fly that way you're not just like on your own 'cause otherwise you fly it for five minutes, you hit the ground and you're done.

- Yeah.

- So they just spend $300 for nothing.

So if you have some help that way - You can work - you can dive into it - on your skillset.

- and help them through it.

- And also if someone walks in the door and they have too much money, I mean, are you guys gonna point 'em towards the big one, - Nothing like that.

- no, please, let's start you here.

- Right.

- Let's work you up there.

We know this is the best thing in the world here, but - We have people come- - We gotta get your skills up so you're not mad or crying- - A lot of the younger customers will come in, they're like, "Oh I wanna fly a jet".

- Mm-hmm.

- Yep.

- And they're starting with that.

- And we say like, no.

- Pump the brakes a little bit.

- Yep.

We'll get you to a jet, let's start with the propeller airplane with a high wing.

- Yeah.

- So the wing location on an airplane determines how easy it is to fly.

A high wing where the wing's up top means it's very stable.

It's not very aerobatic, but it's very stable like a Cub or a Cessna.

Now when you got mid wings, they're a little more aerobatic and then your low wings can do all the crazy, like a Red Bull plane that does- - They're kind of an intermediate plane.

- Okay, okay.

- Low wing is an intermediate and a center wing is fully aerobatic.

- Yeah, he's the expert on airplanes, he knows.

- So.

- [Jay] Wow, that's pretty amazing.

- And to that the point you're saying when you, today's airplanes, majority are made of foam and it's a high density foam.

So if they do break, it just can be glued back together - Oh, okay.

- with foam safe glue.

Versus in the old days we used balsa wood to make the airplanes - You're done.

- and you're done for the most part.

- It's splintered.

I mean, yeah unless- - It can be repaired.

- Yes, yes.

- they can be repaired.

- Like anything wood.

- Much more involved.

- It's another skillset - Mm-hmm, it is.

- involved there though with the repairs of those - Right.

- compared to- - Right.

- And they're two totally different deals.

Foam and and wood are two - Yeah.

- totally different repair sequences, so.

- Yeah.

And I just think it's wonderful being able to talk to you guys about that because you know, a lot of kids these days, they're probably getting the first, they're starting off flying or driving with a $20 car or a $20 drone that maybe has some gyros built in it and totally different experience.

- Oh yeah.

- So, okay.

So with these cars, let's say you start with this and we start working our way up.

So we have some mid-level things, but as you get bigger and bigger, you also have some events.

- Mm-hmm.

- That some of these, we can kind of showcase some of these cars.

So tell us where can I go with this car and have fun with the rest of you guys?

- Well one thing we do once a year, we hold a customer appreciation day at Lake Shawnee where we just go have a nice picnic, play with these cool cars, boats, airplanes and just everybody has a good old time getting together, enjoying this hobby at one place.

There's local tracks here in town where people get together and play.

A lot of guys know each other 'cause they're in the store all the time so they get to meet and exchange numbers and they'll get together on a weekend and go to a certain park and bash together.

So it's been quite nice.

- So do a lot of your customers have their own backyard tracks?

- Many do, absolutely.

I've seen some amazing tracks that customers have shown me that they've built in their own backyard.

Jeremy Hawkins, a good friend of mine, he built a track a few years ago that I've gone and played on.

He comes occasionally and works part-time for me when I need extra help and I'm short a man, he'll come and help out.

- That's fantastic.

All right, one more time for another short break.

When we get back, we'll learn a little bit more about the hobby store.

We'll see you then.

(peaceful music) Welcome back to "Working Capital".

And we have another member of their team here.

We have Carl and?

- Max.

- Max, who I think probably is the star of the show now.

So how did you get involved here?

I mean, it seems like it's one big family, whether it's customers or it's people behind the counter.

- I'm a retired veteran.

I moved to Topeka.

I know, who moves to Topeka on purpose?

I did.

My brother lives here and I wanted to be close to him.

- There's a good pace here.

There's a good pace here.

- It is.

I love the pace here.

- Topeka is underrated.

- It is underrated.

- It really is.

- It really is.

- It is.

I left Colorado and I actually love Topeka.

- You don't hear a lot of that story, which I think that's pretty amazing.

I have a couple other friends I've met - Mm-hmm.

- who made the same thing from the front range and came on down, so.

- And I started as a customer back in March, right?

- Mm, about two years ago.

- Yeah.

- You came in with Max and he just caught our attention on day one and you just were so friendly.

And over time I needed a little help and Andy, or excuse me, Earl here says, "Hey, see if Carl "wants to work one day a week, "you know, he's retired, he's a veteran."

And I'm like, "Yeah, that's a great idea."

And he was like, "Yeah, I can do that."

And part of the team.

- So when you first walked in, what did you come in for?

What was- - I came in for RC cars.

I was looking at the buggies.

- Buggies.

- And then since then I've migrated to airplanes, boats, the Bashers, the Mini-Zs.

- Yeah, Jay, I as the owner, I probably have five to six RC cars at my house.

- Mm-hmm.

- How many do you have at your house?

- Last count was 93.

- 93.

Carl, how many you got at your house?

- 25?

- And he's only a year and a half in and Earl's been here eight years.

They just collect them.

- So next episode we'll be talking to addiction counselors.

(Rich laughing) I'm sure some people's significant others would enjoy that.

But no, I get that.

I mean I don't have that many but, you know, I have four or five that collected that I still have my very first one.

So I mean, it's something you just, you're enamored by him, so - Right.

- 93 of them.

- He won't sell anything he's ever bought.

He just keeps 'em all.

- What was your first one?

- My very first one, oh, I was probably 11 years old.

I got a Kyosho Big Brute for my birthday one summer.

- That'd been 1988 roughly.

- Oh my God.

Okay, okay.

So speaking also with two ex-military and thank you for your service, these kind of hobbies, I know there's a lot of stuff for PTSD and a lot of programs out there that, crafts and hobbies.

How would you guys rate this if you have something that you need that sort of outlet for?

Is this something good, or is this get too much anxiety and too tedious, like I don't want it?

- No, for me it's a lifesaver.

I was diagnosed with PTSD over 10 years ago.

Actually when Covid first hit, actually it was less than that wasn't it?

When Covid first hit, I was having to wear the mask and then next thing you know, I was having anxiety and claustrophobia, which I never knew I had and I got diagnosed with PTSD and so I ended up with him and got into this.

And this helps so much because sitting there and tinkering and taking it out and bashing it and fixing it - And proving it, upbringing.

- Yeah.

- You're getting all spectrums - Yeah.

- of emotions out of it.

So you can get rid of some of that excess here and there.

- Yes.

- Just kind of burn off.

- Yeah.

- It gives us something to focus on - Mm-hmm.

- and it draws in your full attention.

You're not thinking about anything else while you're doing it.

- Yep.

- So it works out for Carl and I, it may not work out for somebody else, but the best advice I could give to anybody that has been diagnosed with PTSD is just find a hobby.

It doesn't have to be anything that we even carry here in our store.

- It could be golf.

- It could be golf, yeah.

- Yeah, whatever you want.

- Just find a hobby.

- Something to draw focus.

- Yes.

- Correct.

- Yeah, because I see why this is kinda that way.

My kind of outlet is, kinda like his, is motorcycle riding, but it's the same thing where all your focus needs to be somewhere so that's why it's so therapeutic.

- Mm-hmm.

- Have you guys ever had thought of a group for ex-veterans that kind of come together just for the hobby side of things or does a lot of this happen when you go home alone?

- There's actually a guy in town named Gene Rolls and he is a Vietnam vet that flew helicopters during Vietnam and he organized a group where it's called Wounded Warriors, where they bring people from the military and give them an RC airplane or helicopter and teach 'em how to fly.

And they have meetings and Gene's getting up there in age so I don't know how active it is, but 10 years ago he was, every week he was in my store talking about the veterans and the work he would do with them and the smile on their face.

And these are people that were distraught, they weren't happy and it just changes their mood and outlook.

- That is fantastic.

And with this community you have some special events still.

So I know you do have kind of a customer appreciation.

- [Rich] Mm-hmm.

- Tell us a little bit about that event and how that kind of got started.

- Well, I'll tell you what, it was actually Earl's idea, so I'm gonna let him have the credit on this.

We do it at Lake Shawnee and I'll let him kind of take over 'cause it's his brainchild and Earl deserves the credit for that great event that we now do every year.

Tell us a little bit about it.

(Jay laughing) - I'd been working for you for about - Eight years?

- four years at the time I think.

- Yeah, at the time, yeah.

So about four years ago we started it.

- Right, and I just wanted to think of something to where we could bring all these customers together and have fun with, you know, outside of the store somewhere we could all, you know, you bring your boats, he'll bring his airplanes, we'll all bring our cars and we'll just have fun together.

- [Jay] Yeah.

- And you know, just something to show a little bit of the, you know, appreciation that we have for our customers because when it comes down to it, if we didn't have customers, we wouldn't be here.

- I think that's fantastic.

You know, a lot of businesses may have a bounce back coupon for customers or something else, but like we've kind of hit over the head here.

This really is a family from this side of the counter to this side of the counter.

So actually thinking and wanting to give back to your customers like that in a fun, let's all get together atmosphere that's, I think it's really lacking, especially with our local businesses as we try to, you know, switch from, we went from our big malls to unfortunately looking like we're going straight online but now I think brick and mortars, especially small businesses are starting to make a comeback.

- Absolutely.

- Especially in Topeka.

I think we're doing a fantastic job here.

So on that note, we are just a couple months out from Christmas.

- Mm-hmm.

- So shopping small businesses here in Topeka is huge.

How do you guys prepare for that as a brick and mortar these days against, you know, Black Friday sales and - Mm-hmm.

- you can get this for 37 cents.

You know, what, how do you, how do you compare?

- So our suppliers send us emails and we're getting them at this time of year about the products that will be on sale on Black Friday.

So anything in our store that if you see it online at a certain price, it will be at that price here at "Dee & Me Hobbies".

So you don't have to pay more to shop locally.

That's the beauty of the thing now.

So we know what's gonna be on sale and sometimes we'll buy extra so we can have a sale in July, you know?

- Yeah.

- There's no rules that we can't buy more, save some for later and then have a July sale or you know, whatever.

And we tend to do that.

So we have some stuff that may been bought on last year's Black Friday, but we'll put it on sale at a later time of the year.

And then our customers appreciate getting those lower prices - Yeah.

- when it's not necessarily Black Friday.

And we do that all the time.

- I mean, Topeka and I think they do it in small scale, maybe a shop here and there, but you used to have the downtown hullabaloo where everyone, that was the big comeback and shop and so hopefully maybe small business, even though being spread around town, maybe a July sale for a lot of small businesses can come together and maybe support each other in that way.

So that's, I mean, it's great to give back that way.

It's nice to know that, yeah, see a good deal online, come in here and check it out first 'cause those people online aren't gonna tell you, "Well this is a better battery.

"You should have this charger."

You won't get that experience.

And I think however much you can invest, whether it's a starter set or a big set, it's gonna last longer in the long run if you have some people with some expertise helping you with it.

- Yes.

- So.

- And one of the reasons we got this new store is so we could expand our hobbies to not just cars and planes.

We now specialize in rockets, models, kites.

We have RC boats, we have slot cars, train sets.

- Timeless favorites, the trains, I mean.

- Train sets.

Number one toy for over 75 years in the United States.

Legos is now the number one toy.

- Oh wow.

- I'm looking at maybe bringing in Legos someday, but tabletop gaming's caught my interest.

I wanna make sure that we can offer as many cool hobbies to our customers and to the city of Topeka so they can have a place to go and get cool things and have fun.

- And you have gyro stabilized motorcycles now that's go around.

- That's true.

- Oh, and for guys in our certain demographic, if you did see stuff when you were little, these RC cars, you saw 'em in magazines or at the store and you couldn't get them, when you come in here, back on top of this back shelf is a lot of some reproductions of old models that we may have fell in love with and not been able to get at that time.

So hopefully someone's not listening that controls the checkbook, but you might find something you used to want that you can get now.

So this has been fantastic.

Thank you, guys.

- Jay, I appreciate you coming and seeing us.

- Thank you, Rich.

Thank you, Earl.

- Thanks.

- Thanks, Carl.

- Jay, thank you.

- And thanks, my little buddy.

Oh.

- Max.

- Max is the best.

So I hope you've all enjoyed learning more about "Dee & Me Hobbies", so don't forget this holiday season, shop local and you won't regret it.

Thanks for watching "Working Capital".

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Funding for "Working Capital" is provided by the "Friends of KTWU" and "Go Topeka".