Elbow Lake gets new hardware store

Elbow Lake, Minn., will soon have a new hardware store called Monahan’s Hardware, according to an article in the Ferguson Falls Journal. Sue and Bob Kulbeik will soon open their fourth location on the same site where Sue’s great-grandfather operated a hardware store in Elbow Lake in the 1890s.

In 2002, the Kulbeiks got into the hardware retailing business when they bought Hardware Hank in Ashby, Minn., with other family members. Then they added a location in Milbank, S.D. A short-time later, Ortonville Economic Development Committee members asked the couple to consider opening a hardware store in Ortonville, which they did.

A visit to Ortonville from the Grant County Economic Development Committee resulted in a similar invitation for Elbow Lake, whose hardware store had closed. A local redevelopment committee lobbied contractors for the new Elbow Lake Hospital to purchase supplies from the new business.

Although the store in not officially open yet, the Kulbeiks told the newspaper they have been letting customers in to make purchases.