June 13, 2000 saw the opening of Kansas City’s first and largest Habitat ReStore facility at 4701 Deramus.  Our 33,000 square foot warehouse holds an abundance of new and used building materials, all available at deeply discounted prices to the general public.  Since opening, ReStore has been very successful in recruiting a variety of sources for merchandise including individuals, professional remodelers, manufacturers and distributors, home builders and many others looking for an alternative to throwing usable materials in the landfill.

Here are some figures to put our phenomenal growth into context:

• In 2000, we averaged monthly gross sales of $10,000 and diverted 16 tons of material.
• In 2007, the monthly average gross sales were $132,000 and diversion per month was 217 tons. 

Because of support from both shoppers and donors, we are now able to provide funding to our Habitat affiliate to cover almost all the administrative and fundraising expenses.  This means that Habitat for Humanity Kansas City’s fundraising efforts are directed almost entirely  toward the funding of new home construction. 

In November 2010, we were very excited to open up a second store location at 303 West 79th Street in the Waldo neighborhood of South Kansas City, MO. This location allowed us to add furniture to the list of items that we sell, and part of the 20,000 sqaure foot space is a beautiful furniture show room.  We are very excited to be in this new neighborhood and look forward to building many new relationships in this area of town.

We are also still investigating the possibility of expanding our operation into the central city neighborhoods where Habitat Kansas City homes are located.  We believe a smaller operation within inner city neighborhoods would drastically increase the availability of our merchandise to homeowners and increase accessibility of our facility for those wanting to drop off donations.  As we make progress on this effort, we will keep the community informed through our quarterly e-newsletter. Sign up for our Email Newsletter.