The Shoppes at Homestead is filled to the brim with antiques and housewares. The shop bounced around from Soddy-Daisy to the North Shore and then to Red Bank before ending up in Hixson because of land changing hands.
J.J. Jarvis typically runs the auctions at The Shoppes at Homestead, when the shop gets packed by potential bidders.Not too many things are still passed down from generation to generation, something Jim Lawson is all too aware of as an antiques auctioneer. But while that may apply to the merchandise at his Hixson antiques and auctioneering shop, it doesn’t apply to the shop itself, which he is passing to his daughter to and grandson.
Lawson, now 82, founded The Shoppes at Homestead in 1969. After bouncing around the North Hamilton region, it is now located at located at 5147 Hixson Pike.
His daughter, Becky Jarvis, and grandson, J.J. Jarvis, claim Lawson is the oldest auctioneer still working in Tennessee – a claim Lawson doesn’t bother refuting. Despite day-to-day activities falling to J.J., his grandfather still works trading, consigning and auctioning off the home goods and furniture he’s gathered or been given throughout his nearly 50 years of service. And the trio does consider it a service.
Lawson said he’s always prided himself on providing quality goods for his customers. Many of those customers were moving into their first home or getting married, meaning full-priced furniture from a retailer often wasn’t in their budget.
“When you can go buy a dresser someone bought for $300 for only $50, you’re doing pretty good,” he said, referencing the savings he passes on to clients.
“The biggest thing is finding out people like us exist,” added J.J.
Lawson got his daughter into the consigning and auctioning business as early as 8 years old. She would accompany him on trips to Louisville and Florida to pick up goods. Traveling across the East Coast and abroad was a major part of the industry at the time, and a big reason for Lawson’s success, he said.
On trips to Boston, London and Belgium, he would either find pieces of handmade, vintage furniture, or he would establish friendships and contacts that would let him know if they found anything they thought he’d be interested in. One man from Kentucky found Lawson an armoire that had records tracing back to the 1700s, when it was first built. Lawson was able to sell that piece for thousands of dollars, netting both him and his Kentucky friend a big windfall.
But the real key to building relationships? Honesty, said Lawson.
“I never did know an auctioneer that wasn’t a man of his word,” he said.
By the 1980s, Lawson had built up enough partnerships and enough of a reputation that people would come to him with goods to sell. One of the most significant, he said, was when he was tasked by the Campbell estate, the creators of MoonPie, to sell some antiques they’d gathered over the years. Their decades-old clock collection, made from rich hardwood, was the finest he’d ever seen, he said.
Despite still being active in the business, Lawson said he is happy to see the tradition he created continuing in his family. J.J. recently became a father to 1-year-old Raelyn Jarvis, who he joked will be the fourth generation to run the auctioneering business.
Even though the industry has changed in the wake of eBay and online shopping, Lawson swears you can’t beat the antique craftsmanship and personality of the vintage furniture he prides himself on finding.
For more information about the family’s shop, call The Shoppes at Homestead at 847-1076.