With a colorful abundance of school supplies and classroom essentials lining the shelves, School Tools has been a go-to stop for schoolteachers and parents in Fayetteville since 1978.
This August, with back-to-school shopping season in full swing, there’s even more. School Tools has expanded to over 12,000 square feet of space with its move to Highland Centre on Raeford Road.
Originally located in Tallywood Shopping Center, the business had been on Robeson Street downtown since 2016.
Brian Barber, 48, has owned the store for 25 years. He started working at School Tools when he was a junior at South View High School in Hope Mills. Dee Banta was then the owner.
“I was friends with her son, Neil, and started working there in 1992,” Barber says.
He started working full time when he graduated from high school, leaving briefly for classes at what’s now the University of Mount Olive. He bought School Tools in 1999 at the age of 23.
Barber attributes his success as a young business owner to Banta and to the employees who have been with him throughout his career.
“(Banta) really took a chance with me and helped me learn everything. Then I had great people around me. Really, I inherited a great staff, and I was lucky that all of them stayed with me,” Barber says.
Soon after he bought the Fayetteville store, he opened a second location, which was open for eight years.
“I went back and forth to Kernersville from Fayetteville for almost a decade to operate the second store,” Barber says.
He eventually closed that location to concentrate on his Fayetteville store, which employs a staff of eight to 10.
Family ties
One of his former employees, Phyllis Prevatt, was among the first shoppers at his grand reopening in July.
She started working at School Tools in 1991 when she and her husband moved here. He was in the military. When they decided to retire in Fayetteville, she continued working at School Tools for 25 years before going part time and then retiring.
“I was working already when Brian started and loved working at my job in shipping and receiving. By the time COVID happened, I was only working the back-to-school season,” says Prevatt.
Looking around at the new space with its wide aisles and fully stocked shelves, she could not help but beam with pride at what Barber and the staff has accomplished at the new location. She thinks Highland Centre will be great for foot traffic.
Prevatt’s daughter, Laurie Shearin, also worked at School Tools when she was in high school before graduating from Appalachian State University to become a teacher.
“She worked here from the age of 13 through high school. I guess you can say this helped inspire her to become a teacher,” says Prevatt.
Barber says he caters to all shoppers, but his key customers include teachers, day care workers, church nursery and Sunday school coordinators, home-schooling families and parents.
“Obviously, we have teachers who come in because we carry everything they would need for their classrooms,” he says.
For day care centers, the store sells educational toys and Kindermats that are sought after for nap time.
“We also have a large section for churches,” Barber notes.
Changing needs
The home-schooling selection has expanded greatly in the past decade as the popularity of teaching children at home has skyrocketed.
“Home-schooling has blown up in the last 10 years. There is a great community here, and a lot of home-schooling families shop with us because they know they can get what they need here,” says Barber.
Parents stock up on school supplies for their children or supplemental materials such as flash cards or summer bridge books.
“Parents and their children come in to get what the big-box stores do not carry. We have the items like handwriting paper and other supplies year-round. Most of the stores only put supplies on the shelf before school, but we have what students need, especially when they run out midyear,” says Barber.
Kamilah Evans, a training and curriculum specialist with the Army’s Morale, Welfare and Recreation office at Fort Liberty, has been shopping at School Tools for more than a decade.
“They have the best selection in early educational toys and bulletin-board supplies. But really, I find something new every time I come in here. I push a lot of social/emotional and cognitive tools for what I do helping military children with anxiety, and I can get everything here,” Evans says.
She likes that she can find her preferred brands such as Kaplan and Melissa & Doug.
“But I don’t have to wait two weeks for those things to ship. I can get them same-day here, which makes my job so much easier,” says Evans, who shops for supplies for MWR’s Children and Youth Services division.
Part of a community
“I said I’d never move again, but then this space came open,” Barber says.
Barber relocated School Tools to the former Thomas & Howard Cash and Carry building on Robeson Street, just outside downtown Fayetteville, in 2016 when its space at Tallywood Shopping Center was torn down to make room for Publix supermarket. It had been in Tallywood for almost 40 years.
The Robeson Street building was a good fit space-wise, but Barber says he missed being in a shopping center near other retail businesses.
“It was a great space, but we were off the beaten path. When it came to back-to-school shopping, business was great, but off season, we didn’t have a lot of foot traffic,” he says. “When you are in a shopping center, people just pop in, but with the location on Robeson, people had to plan the trip.”
Barber says School Tools’ lamination service is popular.
“We have doctors, nurses, military and more coming in to get documents, maps and other things laminated. It’s a full-scale machine that will help families preserve keepsakes for family reunions, news articles they want to keep,” he says.
Also popular are supplies for bulletin boards like paper, letters and trim.
“Yes, you can order from us online, but it’s a little different when you want to look at the colors, the texture, the size of letters. It’s hard to decorate when you don’t know the shades of the color or how tall the letters are,” Barber says.
He appreciates the community feel among longtime businesses including Tiny Town and Major Appliance, which are also at Highland Centre.
“I’ve missed talking with neighbors,” Barber says.
Observing the hustle and bustle of shoppers at the start of a new business week, Prevatt looked around at the brightly colored shelves and natural light coming through the windows.
“Back-to-school is like our Christmas in July,” she says. “It’s the busiest time of the year, and this store is going to do well.”
Education station: School Tools’ new space makes it a go-to place
