Paul Nelson squinted into his cell phone, lining up a photo Thursday of about 30 people crowded in front of the back bay door of Bigfoot Auto. A Cuban cigar hung from his lips as he prepared the shot.
From the back of the group, Mayor Tom Morphet started a rendition of “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow,” and the rest of the group joined in as Nelson smiled and watched.
It was the last day Nelson, who has owned and operated Bigfoot Auto for 45 years, was responsible for the gas station and National Automotive Parts Association (NAPA) shop. He sold to Haines Industrial, which took over Aug. 1.
When asked what he’d do first as an official retiree, Nelson quipped, “I’m not going to show up here!”
Nelson said the business has changed over the last few years. The auto repair business became harder and harder to run, and he finally had to close it down.
“You don’t repair things, now you replace parts. You still have to have qualified technicians, but when I started you rebuilt carburetors, starters, everything,” he said. “I was unable to find anyone qualified that could carry on the level of expertise, and I didn’t want [subpar service] happening under the company name.”
They also operated the school bus driving contract for 23 years. And they had a towing business for some time, but that stopped during the pandemic. Nelson said it takes a lot of work to run Bigfoot, but he’s made it happen for years because of “good help, good crew, and good customers.”
As he contemplated handing it off to someone else, Nelson broke out a box of Cuban cigars and passed them around as Haines Industrial owner Haynes Tormey grilled burgers for the crowd.
The two have been negotiating a sale on and off since 2020.
Tormey, who grew up in the Chilkat Valley but moved back in 2015, said businesses were struggling when he first got back to the community.
“We started Haines Industrial and named it Haines Industrial because we were going to service every industry,” he said. “The actual slogan of the company is ‘spinning the gears of industry’ and that was because our target market was to support and uphold other businesses and enable them to try and build their dreams.”
Now, he said, he has more confidence and thinks other business owners do as well.
Last year, Tormey bought a warehouse and property behind Bigfoot. As the general contractor expands on the lot, he said he has specific plans for the store.
“Our intention is to remodel the whole building and build it out into a NAPA that imitates other NAPA stores in the lower 48,” he said, gesturing around the empty warehouse behind the gas station’s current retail storefront. “That’s why we cleared out the shop because this shop space is no longer useful for us. This is going to be turned into more retail parts and to support whatever industry we can: commercial fishing, timber, trucking, construction, anything we can fit in here.”
He said the goal is to provide the same amount of service that Nelson did for decades, and then expand on it — though there are currently no plans to reopen the automotive repair-side of the business.
“I’m not going to attack that until I can find certified ASE (Automotive Service Excellence) mechanics and there’s no one in town,” Tormey said.