Throwback Thursday: Armstrong Building Materials

The September 29, 1980 issue of National Home Center News, the forerunner of HBSDealer, profiled Armstong Building Materials of Los Angeles, and found a study in contrasts – “the old and the new, the traditional and the modern.”

The home center concept was evolving rapidly in California in the 1980s, and Armstrong was a 20,000 sq. ft. format that seemed to want to serve the whole gamut of customers – the builder, the DIYer and the decorator.

Owner Chuck Armstrong told NHCN that he attends hardware markets, while his daughter Kathy, an interior designer, hits the gift shows. “She brings stuff in that I swear is not going to sell, like silk flowers of papier-mache parrots. They just sell like mad.”

Spoiler alert: the company is no longer in business.

Westwood, Brentwood and Bel-Air communities were just minutes away from Armstrong’s 2.5-acre lot in Los Angeles. That meant expensive and affluent neighborhoods.

How expensive? “A two-bedroom house carries a price tag of well over $200,000,” according to the article.

 # # #

Do you know something about Armstrong Building Materials? Let us know at [email protected].