Greg L.
Yelp
Southland was founded in 1935, but I've only been a customer since the late 70s.
In the Montrose they've been the best neighborhood hardware since forever. The store which claims "to have almost everything," really does.
Paint, hardware, plumbing, lighting, locks and keys, wood, planting equipment and soils, concrete and caulking, laundry and kitchen goods, custom cut glass, power tools, nuts, bolts, nails and screws, propane exchange, bird and pet supplies, sundries, and just about everything in between -- like a big collection of pocket knives and some lotions.
You will wonder how a store with aisles so narrow can stuff so many employees who buzz about, like fat and lazy bees over fed on nectar. And yes, some of them aren't always in the most pleasant mood. Aside from a handful of youngsters, the majority look like retirees, or ancients who should be patrolling the corridors of a nursing home, and in the preternaturally busy store of both contractors and entitled River Oaks matrons and younger Southampton prepsters, you can imagine all of the stupid questions and harried insults they have endured. And a few of these guys have probably been at this store for 40+ years.
And it makes a difference.
Can't find something on a shelf in a big box store? Just give up. Here you can locate someone who will drag it out from some dark recess in a storage room.
Prices are generally fair, sometimes cheaper than Amazon or Home Depot, sometimes more expensive. They are part of the Do-it hardware cooperative, so they have a lot of miscellaneous inexpensive stuff and specials.
I'm not usually one to grouse about the ever thinning ranks of mom and pop stores via modernization, but this is a case of a long standing valuable institution that would be dearly missed if it was no longer there. Berings hardware, 15 minutes away on Westheimer and another on Bissonnet, is better run and more modern, but they lack they feeling of ol skool Americana and the rekindled glee of a young boy roaming the overstuffed aisles.
For those of you in the Heights, C&D Hardware is another unique store, just like every small village once had.