RONA franchise opens in High Prairie

As a reward to customers for their patience while the new RONA store was being set up, customers entered a draw for a week’s holiday at the Banff Gate Mountain Resort. Roy Ransbottom was the winner. Left-right are Rose Emard, Ralph Emard, Roy Ransbottom and Debbie Wales. Not shown are Trever Sekulich, Ryan Dubé and Lee Nussbaumer, who also work for the store.

Mac Olsen
South Peace News

The new RONA store in High Prairie appeals to do-it-yourself handymen as well as contractors, say owners Trever Sekulich and Debbie Wales. Located east of the TD Canada Trust branch, the new store officially opened Feb. 2. They will hold its grand opening in May. Wales and Sekulich started constructing the store in June 2007 and moved in Oct. 31, 2007. They owned and operated a paint and flooring store for a couple of years and wanted to increase the number of products they could offer. RONA offers everything for home improvement, including ceramic tiles, flooring, hardware, cabinets, fabrics, wallpaper and Hunter Douglas window coverings. They plan to expand into lumber over the next two years. “We wanted to broaden our scope into hardware and home improvement products,” says Wales. “We’re looking forward to the spring, when we’ll have gardening supplies and accessories.” Sekulich has 30 years of building experience and can provide expert advice. “I know all the building products, so we thought it would be easy to move into that,” he says. RONA is an environmentally responsible company and Sekulich and Wales are steadily increasing their line of eco-friendly products. This includes cleaners, garbage bags and fertilizers, as well as the RONA and Sico lines of zero-percent volatile organic compound paints. The majority of their shipments arrive in reusable “totes” to reduce cardboard. They also re-use their wooden pallets. The Sekulichs are promoting themselves as a regional dealer, taking orders and inquiries from Falher, Kinuso, McLennan, Valleyview and other communities. Sekulich says RONA is Canadian-owned, buys from Canadian suppliers whenever possible and offers a good product line that is affordable. He adds the store has a real time connection to the warehouse. “If it is in the warehouse and we need it, it will be tagged as ours to go out on the next weekly shipment,” he says. Sekulich and Wales are community-minded and support several High Prairie programs, which included providing all the flooring for the Elks clubhouse draw in 2006. As a reward for their patience while the store was being set up, RONA encouraged customers to enter a draw for a week’s holiday for six people at the Banff Gate Mountain Resort. The draw, held Jan. 21, was won by Roy Ransbottom.

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