Junk King’s warehouse near San Antonio International Airport is chock-full of salvaged items. This is a randomly drawn treasure from offices and homes around the city.
There’s a poster for the movie Casablanca, a white peacock chair, a foosball table, a Pyrex container box, a gold bicycle, and a glass Sprite bottle with a label advertising the Spurs’ 2003 championship. Yellowed letters between military personnel and their families and a $200 a month mortgage note issued in 1897 are kept on a desk salvaged from work.
“It’s amazing what people don’t want anymore,” said DeWitt Rote, who owns the Junk King franchise with his wife Shelly at 10415 Perrin Beitel Road.
They’re not a junk store, they’re a junk-removal business.
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A Junk King employee found an old cash register at work.
Kin Man Hui / Staff Photographer
A leather sofa is placed near the suitcase. VCRs, mason jars, vases, truck tires, pet carriers, lampshades, chests of drawers and more. Paintings of Disney princesses, delicate gold-plated teacups, butter churn rests near Wii consoles, old cash registers, curtains in clear plastic packaging.
Some items are not long. He ensures that 60% of the “junk” his employees collect from homes and offices is recycled, reused, or reused so that it doesn’t end up in landfills.
Your suitcase will be sent to Roy Maas Youth Alternatives. Roy Mars Youth Alternatives provides support and shelter to children and young people at risk. Books are donated to the library, pet supplies to the Animal Defense League, and aging electronics to the San Antonio Museum of Science and Technology.
Furnishings are reserved for San Antonio Habitat for Humanity, Goodwill San Antonio, and the San Antonio Salvation Army. Wheelchairs and walkers will be reused by Project MEND, which provides medical equipment for people with disabilities. Concrete, scrap metal and wood are sent to recycling facilities.
The Junk King’s office contains relics left by homeowners and businesses. Desks, chairs, refrigerators, maps of San Antonio, Batman and Robin posters, The Beatles’ Abbey Road album.
We regularly open our warehouses and hold garage sales.
“It’s like Christmas,” Shelley said.
Items collected by the Junk King include paintings, furniture, and lamps.
Kin Man Hui / Staff PhotographerThe couple are fairly new to the junk removal industry. A few years ago, accountant DeWitt got fed up with deadlines and started looking for a new career. Before purchasing Junk’s King franchise in 2017, he and his wife, who are still alternative education teachers, considered several different businesses, including restaurants, liquor stores, and FedEx Ground his route. was
Moving into a new field was a challenge. They’ve had to learn where to take their surplus, how to manage their employees, and how to handle their customers, but it’s been a welcome change, they say.
“It’s different every day,” DeWitt said.
About 85% of Junk King’s work is housing-related, with calls coming in to ask for a deceased relative’s home to be emptied, to clean his own house, or to help a friend who is hoarding things.
The rest of the work is commercial and includes companies shrinking or closing office space during the coronavirus pandemic.
Junk King employees have amassed quirky items such as family movie reels, 1950s woolen clothing, ivory tusks, a signed photo of President Lyndon B. Johnson, and Chinese artifacts.
“You get a glimpse into people’s lives,” Shelley said.
DeWitt said prices for junk removal typically start at $99 and each truck can hold about 18 cubic yards of cargo. His 19 employees at Junk King wear his zip-up suits with masks. In addition to income from commissions for picking up and shipping items from homes and businesses, some materials are sold.
Business slowed in March due to the pandemic, leveled off in April, but has accelerated since then, the couple said.
They added a second Junk King location near Bandera Road in northwest San Antonio. This is part of a rapidly growing city and at each warehouse he plans to have three trucks. Having a place there allows you to drop off items for sorting and quickly move on to the next job.
DeWitt says that 99% of the time, when workers ask to store items, they say yes. The couple also keeps a few finds to themselves, including sparkling Snoopy Christmas decorations, a desk for their son’s distance learning, and a screen door they’d like to use for their greenhouse.
“It’s like looking at a treasure,” Shelley said.
madison.iszler@express-news.net
