A tradition is coming to an end in Wichita, but is the store?

Though it’s not for certain if a Wichita retail tradition is coming to an end or not, one thing is for certain:

Robin Van Huss and her husband, Art Davis, are getting out of the furniture business and soon will start a sale at their Traditions Home store in College Hill.

“We would love for someone to carry this on,” Van Huss said. “If we don’t find the right buyer, we will close the store.”

The store is temporarily closing Friday in preparation for a retirement sale that begins Feb. 11.

Through the years, Van Huss used to say, “I’ll retire when Tom Brady does.”

And though the football quarterback did just announce his retirement, Van Huss and Davis aren’t actually retiring.

“We just have other things to focus on,” Van Huss said.

She calls herself and Davis “serial entrepreneurs.”

“We have a million ideas.”

As “huge rescue animal people,” they also want to volunteer.

Van Huss said it’s not that she and her husband are joining the great resignation nationally, but she said the pandemic has been “kind of an eye-opener.”

“We have had personal experience with COVID, and it is life-changing.”

Still, Van Huss knows what people will think when they hear her news.

“I know it’s going to disappoint people, and I hate that.”

Van Huss and Davis have talked to some potential buyers.

“We welcome more inquiries,” Van Huss said.

They’re keeping their Overland Park Traditions store and their dozen commercial properties.

Van Huss said she has amazing teams at both stores.

“We are nothing without our staff.”

However, the Overland Park store is only 5,000 square feet, and the Wichita one is 15,000 square feet.

“This one’s all-consuming,” Van Huss said.

Van Huss said if they decide to sell it would have to be to “someone who loves working with people” and taking care of them.

“It would just have to be the right fit.”

Van Huss said she knows if it does sell, “Anyone’s going to want to put their own spin on the business.”

Traditions has about a year’s worth of inventory because Van Huss has been trying to stock up due to national and international inventory shortages and freight issues.

She said she has “great furniture that normally would take seven, eight months to order.”

Traditions will continue to take special orders, too. Even if the store closes, Van Huss said she will remain until every order is filled.

Van Huss figures it probably will take three or four months to sell the store’s inventory. Sale prices will vary, but some items will be up to 75% off. Van Huss said that’s a special bargain given that furniture prices continue to rise nationally.

“Prices are going to continue to go up. It’s a great time for people to take advantage of us.”

A tradition begins

Van Huss was living in Washington, D.C., and finishing a business degree at the University of Maryland when she first got the idea for Traditions. She was working for the Department of Defense, and Davis was a lawyer with the Justice Department.

“And we found a store that we were absolutely obsessed with.”

The store, Village Furniture in Vienna, Va., had a lot of lines that Traditions sells now, such as Gat Creek and Stickley.

Knowing she was returning to her hometown of Wichita, Van Huss told one of her professors, “You know, there’s this store I love that has all these things that have never been offered in the Midwest before.”

He suggested she approach the store and offer a consulting fee to learn what she could about opening her own.

Instead, the owners offered for her to work for free on the weekends.

“It was like getting a PhD,” Van Huss said. “They were amazing. They were smart. They were fair.”

She said the husband-and-wife team continued to be phenomenal mentors through the years, and while they were both great, Van Huss said the wife “was just (a) brilliant business person and treated her customers like gold.”

She advised Van Huss to “just remember, don’t get greedy.”

“It was really great advice for anybody in business.”

Van Huss grew up on Dellrose in College Hill and knew she wanted her store in the neighborhood.

“I wouldn’t even consider anywhere other than College Hill.”

Traditions opened at 3203 E. Douglas next to the Crown Uptown Theatre in the middle of a “huge recession.”

“That’s how dumb we were,” Van Huss said.

She was, in so many words, told that by “the same bankers who wouldn’t give me a loan.”

“I was so naive. I thought, here’s my business plan. I’m gonna get a check.”

She said that first space “was crazy. It was no parking, and it was tiny. We had a ball in there.”

Then she moved to 3224 E. Douglas just east of Hillside, which is next door from its current address at 3220 E. Douglas.

That’s a very popular retail strip now, but in 1984, Van Huss said, “Trust me, it wasn’t.”

The area has flourished in recent years with a lot of upgrades to buildings near Douglas and Hillside, several of which belong to Van Huss and Davis.

Over the years, Van Huss said she’s enjoyed being a mentor to other business owners as she herself was once mentored.

“It’s just so rewarding,” she said.

“Basically, being in a business is being a problem solver every single day.”

There is no problem — or lack of sales — that is leading Van Huss and Davis to their decision.

“Our business has never been better than it is right now,” Van Huss said.

“We’re doing this because we want to. It’s not always about money.”

This story was originally published February 3, 2022 at 4:38 AM.