Alaska Mining Superstore

[Dean Stone]

Very nice store, You just need to find some nice gold claims to lease, and rent to us dumb butts that don't know how to go about that. That way you can make money with your store and on the claims. We can rent a week or two from you every summer .

[Steve Herschbach]

On 2/28/2023 at 11:40 PM, GeoBill said:

I have to ask.

When I was working in Alaska, I'm guessing in the early to mid '80s, I picked up a T-Shirt from a mining supply store in Anchorage that had in large letters "SUCK ROCKS" and in smaller letters "with a Keene Gold Dredge". My wife coveted that shirt and it went with her when we parted. I missed that shirt (I guess more than the ex) and went over to the Keene Engineering store in in LA to see about getting another one. Their answer, was Nope, only available in Alaska.

Any chance that was your store? Would love to get another.

Cheers

The shirts are now in stock again. Though now it says "SUCK ROCKS..... with a gold dredge" to make it generic to all brands.

I was just up at the new mining store and am happy to report they just broke a million dollars in sales for their first year, and actually turned a profit even with all the startup expenditures, both items exceeding our expectations. I'm working on a new catalog website for them right now, but it will be an ongoing project to add product and photos for the next few months. The main issue being good photos, as for a lot of our stuff there are only poor ones or none to be snagged on the internet. I may have to go up again just to spend a week getting product photos. Anyway, still fleshing out the framework/details and but it is mainly functional at this time at https://miningsuperstore.com/

We might go to direct online sales down the road, but it is not really the main focus, as sales figures with no website at all might reflect. We are adding Gold Claimer brand trommels and such this year, and things like that are not really point and click shopping. But we do want people to be able to see what is on hand more without having to make a drive from Talkeetna or Fairbanks, or flight from Nome, and the catalog site will help with that.

The employee owned stores as a whole had record sales and record profits - again. We had a fabulous company breakfast meeting on the last day where Dudley and I announced the big news and handed out the bonuses. Not only did we get a tear jerking standing ovation but the crew gave Dudley and I each a memento. Very satisfying. 

[phrunt]

The story behind the store is great and the staff are clearly so proud to be part of it all.  A life changer for many.

I couldn't help but notice this gold pan/sluice? contraption on the shelves, I've never seen one before, what is it called? I'll have to look it up.

[Steve Herschbach]

Banjo Pan from Gold Cube

https://goldcube.net/product/banjo-pan-worlds-fastest-gold-pan/

[Steve Herschbach]

I'm going to brag up a little project I have been working on. As the AMDS nerd I have single-handedly been building a new website for the location. Got the domain name, chose the hosting service, chose the software to run the store on, then set it up by customizing it for our use, and then the tedious part - adding all that product. I got most of it up in a month of spare time work, and now add bits and pieces when the mood hits me. Funny looking at this old thread, but reminds me I should get the Banjo Pan added to the site.

You will note that the site has no prices or buy buttons. It is basically a catalog site. This is for several reasons. First, it makes my job way easier. Second, it is being realistic about a new reality. Shipping costs from the Lower 48 to Alaska and then back down to the Lower 48 are so much higher than they were 20 years ago mean we realistically can't compete with outfits based in the Lower 48 on price alone. Free shipping on a gold panning kit to the Lower 48? Are you kidding? It is more than we make on the kit! It also means that if we charge that shipping people down south will just buy somewhere else, so we are not going to waste time (money) chasing a market we can't realistically serve. There are some higher price smaller size items like metal detectors where it might work, but for now we are trying to do what we do best - serve the Alaska market. If people down south see something we have that they want, then they can contact us for a quote.

For me as the web head though implementing a system that will update price increases, current inventory, and shipping is more than I want to tackle being off site. At a minimum I'd need to tap into the company database and script the solution to that can of worms. Long story short a catalog site at least shows what we have while avoiding a lot of maintenance headaches. I've set it all up so they could add online sales later if they want to but pretty much told them it will have to be somebody else doing it other than me.

With that set of parameters it has been a fun project as I enjoy building sites. I like them clean and simple as possible and I like good photos. That has been a challenge given a lot of the crappy imagery outfits like Keene have available. Luckily new AI upscaling tools are available now that let me do way more with what is available - plus the fun for me of playing with those new tools. Topaz Gigapixel AI is truly amazing it what it can do and constantly improving. Just eliminating backgrounds has gone from hours long work to seconds now, and free in MS paint instead of a fortune in Photoshop. Anyway, doing what I can with what I can legitimately lift from vendor websites, and will fill the gaps taking photos on my next visit to Alaska.

Enough of the nerd talk. I'm really only posting about it as I have and am putting a lot of work into it and am proud of my new baby and want to show it off a little. Check it out if you are interested at

https://miningsuperstore.com/shop/ 

and do not miss the stuff we have you don't see in most shops - mini excavators, trommels, the Sierrablaster, etc.

[phrunt]

I've been using Gigapixel AI for years, mostly to enlarge images, it does a great job up to about 4x. 

That's a clean tidy nice fast site, probably the only thing I'd do differently is a "contact us about this product" on each product, seeing there is no way to buy it a contact about it would be a nice little shortcut on each product.

The fun I could have on some of those Jansen products! Wow.  Very cool.

[Steve Herschbach]

32 minutes ago, phrunt said:

That's a clean tidy nice fast site, probably the only thing I'd do differently is a "contact us about this product" on each product, seeing there is no way to buy it a contact about it would be a nice little shortcut on each product.

I put a direct link on a few product descriptions here and there where I want special emphasis on that. The contact info is at the top or bottom of every page so it's available with a single click no matter where you are. I'm sure people who want to contact the company will be able to do it and if not - they are not trying. This is not the main website really, more like a sub-site the main site links to as a way to highlight the mining product. The main big boy toys are there......

https://www.akmining.com/

 

[phrunt]

Wow, awesome products there, boats, snow mobiles! 

i like the little Podium text chatbot on there.

[mn90403]

Good old-fashioned service (if the employees have the time) of taking calls, creating repour and getting them to make an order.  Free 'solutions' lead to sales.  Now they can add a text question and response.

[Bugler]

Steve, it has all been said very well.  What a great, professional job!

Best of luck to you going forward.

Bugler