In July 2007, the North and Gordon families purchased Hollimans from the Musk and Robertson families.
With the growing need for a more streamlined rural service in the community, in 2008 Hollimans partnered with Combined Rural Traders (CRT) and rural supply products were added to the business model. As a result, ‘Hollimans Hardware & Rural Services’ was registered as a business name and trade began.
In a further step to diversify its goods and services for the community, in 2009 the North and Gordon families purchased Mitre 10 on Gill Street in Charters Towers. At this time, the ‘Hollimans Home Timber & Hardware’ business name was registered. Later that year a gun and ammunition shop was added to Hollimans Hardware and Rural Services and the Hollimans brand expanded once again.
With all this growth, in October 2010, Hollimans Pty Ltd was established as a company. Benjamin Britty North and Alistair Don Gordon were joint directors and a clear vision to combine all stores under the one roof was born.
In 2011 ‘Hollimans Rural Supplies’ was registered as a business name and was now the sole trading name, encompassing all aspects of the hardware and rural services business.
In 2012, Hollimans Pty Ltd purchased the ‘Weston Carrying Service’ (Westons Transport) business and five acres of land close to the Charters Towers CBD, once again expanding the scope of the business.
The group of businesses worked extremely well together for many years but Ben North saw a problem in the market for his rural customers when it came to water. So in May 2017, Ben and Alistair ventured overseas and purchased a Polythene Extrusion Line to make polypipe. The view was to build a polypipe factory in Australia to service customers who needed to capture and direct water for their stock.
In early 2018 Alistair left the business and Ben North continued on as sole director of Hollimans Pty Ltd. At that time, ‘Viper Water Solutions’ was established and a five-acre block of land was acquired in Seymour Street, Hughenden. Development plans for the polypipe factory began and by the latter half of that year the poly factory was well under way. In mid-2019, the first big order of polypipe was produced at the Viper Water factory and delivered to our first customer via Westons Transport.
In 2020, ‘Charters Towers Furniture’ was added to the Hollimans group of businesses and is located in a prime retail position at 108-110 Gill Street, Charters Towers. The furniture shop works in nicely for our customers and the overall retail focus of the business.
In May 2022, after ten years of continuously working on its vision to combine its retail and rural businesses under the one roof, Hollimans joined the Mitre 10 buying group at a Sapphire level and ‘Hollimans Rural Mitre 10’ was officially opened for business. So too was Hollimans’ gun and ammunition shop which was rebranded under ‘GoWild Outdoors’.
Both stores proudly sit at the pinnacle of the new Gold Tower commercial precinct in Charters Towers.
We are extremely proud of our heritage and what we have built upon it. Our ongoing vision is simple: to continue to serve our community and tailor our business to the ever-changing needs of rural life.