“When I first started, I was totally optimistic and thought everybody was going to love my stuff,” Hunt said. “After a few months… that wasn’t going to happen.”

by Allison Mueller

The red brick building on the corner of Main and Third Street is one of many old structures in Winona’s historical downtown. What makes this space unique is what waits to be discovered downstairs.

Along the Main Street side of the building, a steep staircase leads curious customers to a hefty door. A large red and white “A-Z COLLECTABLES” sign hangs above the entry to this hidden shop of treasures.

The creak of the door as it opens and reveals the shop’s unique contents is enough to give any antique collector goose bumps. Narrow pathways are carved throughout the basement space that holds a nine-person maximum occupancy.

To the right, past the collection of old lunchboxes suspended from ceiling pipes and an arrangement of still-packaged toy cars hanging on a wall, shop owner Neil Hunt sits surrounded by mountains of his treasures. He inspects the locks one of his regular customers, Michael, has brought in.

Hunt has owned A-Z Collectables for more than 23 years, and said he looks to buy things of personal interest to add to his ever-growing collection of antiques and collectables.

“I don’t buy what I don’t like,” Hunt said. “I’ve always liked books and kitchen items, antique lighting, definitely toy cars. The stuff I really don’t want to part with I take home. I have several hundred cars here, but at home I have another couple hundred.”

Originally from Eastern Michigan, work with a natural foods bakery brought Hunt to the co-op in La Crosse two or three times a week to deliver bread. He often stopped at donation stores and yard sales in the area to acquire unique items and then sold them.

Hunt said, “A friend of mine who I was selling my pickings to, she was one of my regular dealers I sold to, kept saying, ‘If I was as old as you are, I’d open my own shop.’ And finally, I did.”

A-Z Collectables opened in 1993 in half of the street-level space where the kate + bella clothing store is. After a few years, Hunt needed more space and moved his business downstairs.

“When I first started, I was totally optimistic and thought everybody was going to love my stuff,” Hunt said. “After a few months… that wasn’t going to happen.”

Hunt’s “stuff” encompasses a vast range of items including nonfiction and classic books, hand-painted pottery from the 1950s, old kitchen tools, antique lighting, games and more. There is also an entire corner of the shop dedicated to antique Winona items – bottles, toy mascots from schools, buttons and local calendar plates.

“I can probably make a collection out of just about anything you hand me,” Hunt said. “Whether it’s a collection that would be worth anything, or that anybody else would want, that’s totally up to debate.”

Hunt, who has been retired for a few years, acquired different jobs to support his buying and selling habit. The job he was at the longest was with RGIS Inventory Service, which required him to travel to western Wisconsin and southern Minnesota. He said he could only open his shop several days a week, but the days were not consistent.

Now A-Z Collectables is open weekdays from 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. and from 12:30 to 5 p.m. on Sundays. Hunt said business booms during the summer compared to winter where he “just squeaks by.”

Hunt said during summer he makes a profit. When it comes to antique shops, he said the more the merrier in terms of attracting customers.

“It’s not like antique shops compete,” Hunt explained. “We compete when it comes to buying the stuff, but when it comes to selling, you need several to attract collectors looking to buy and think this is a good town to go to and make it worth the visit.”

According to Hunt, his antique shop is one of around three left in town. He said when he started there were six or seven shops in Winona. Much of the collecting market lives online, Hunt said, with sites such as eBay and Etsy. But, in addition to tourists, there are always the regulars who stop by the store.

One of these regulars is Dale Hadler, who has been coming to Hunt’s antique shop for four years. Hadler said he occasionally brings in items to sell, but stops by a few times a week to buy items, specifically antique things made of die-cast and aluminum.

“Back in 2013 I moved to Winona and I was curious about this place so I came down and checked out this shop,” Hadler said. “He has a nice collection… it’s a little bit of everything.”

Hunt said he is surprised at some items that sell. He explained how years ago he had one of his largest single sales when a couple came to the shop and bought several boxes of Fire King dishes, totaling several hundred dollars. They packaged the vintage glassware and brought it back to the store they were opening in Japan.

He also recalls an instance where a buyer purchased a $10 bucket from him that ended up being an antique lard pail worth $1,000, which Hunt found out once the buyer called him back to share its worth. Hunt had mistaken the pail for an old kid’s sandbox bucket.

“What made mine unique and what threw me off, was that it didn’t say lard on it, but it had a cute little picture of a pig on it,” Hunt said. “That was one of my larger missteps, which will happen with antiques.”

Hunt said he now looks online to research the items he acquires. He will also tell people who bring in items to sell him if they are better off trying to sell their items online.

“Some things will sit here for years, but on eBay, if it’s priced right, it’s gone in two weeks,” Hunt said. “I buy things on eBay, but I don’t sell. I need to, just to thin out some of my things.”

The abundance of antiques stacked and piled while strategically organized in A-Z Collectables offers a journey through history – something a buyer would not experience online.

Hunt said, “When you walk in the door here, it doesn’t take you too long and you understand the character, heart and passions of the guy that’s running it.”