Easly Progress

Batteries Plus opens in Easley
May 17 , 2009
by Candice Harper

EASLEY - The nation's leader in battery recycling opened its doors to the Easley community on May 11. Batteries Plus, the nation's largest chain, offers the community a one-stop source for all battery needs.

Bates Kennedy, owner of seven locations in South Carolina and Georgia decided to open a store in Easley, because Easley is a growing community and a great place to protect the market in the franchise. The location is perfect for the store, he said, because of its close quarters with Powdersville, Clemson and the Keowee areas.

Kennedy got his start when the textile industry went away about eight years ago. He began looking for a franchise and found Batteries Plus. It's a national franchise with approximately 370 stores nationwide in around 43 states.

He first opened a store in Greenville, then in North Charleston and Savannah. Half of the business is half-commercial and half is retail. He said that the retail part of the business is doing well because everyone uses batteries.

"I think in this economic time, for example, people are buying a new laptop battery instead of buying a new laptop," said Kennedy.

Battery Plus handles around 20,000 different kinds of batteries. Kennedy said that no one has the depth of batteries that they do. He said they sell them all.

"People don't realize but they probably use 20 to 30 batteries everyday," said Kennedy.

"From garage door openers, to cell phones, to smoke alarms, to television remotes, and that's the area we specialize in. We have all the batteries that are hard to find."

A big part of the business is repair service. They replace batteries and drill packs themselves. They have competitive prices with Wal-Mart, Target, Home Depot, Lowes, and others especially with larger volumes and quantities.

"We provide a recycling program for our commercial customers and one for our retail customers," said Kennedy. "We are the only one in the area that recycles 100 percent of the batteries that we sale which is very important with the green movement in today's society."

Batteries Plus offers service and repair work on many appliances that you use in your daily life like drills, razors, and battery packs. They also offer a wide-range of watch batteries.

"We also sell a lot of flashlights," said Kennedy. "We represent the three best flashlight manufacturers: Streamlight, Surefire, and Pelican, so that makes it attractive because we have a tremendous amount of lighting equipment."

Batteries Plus is also unique in that they handle car and truck batteries, as well as wheelchair and lift batteries he said. They also offer motorcycle, ATV, and loan and garden batteries along with batteries used in everyday life activities including electrical dog collars, golf cart batteries, and children's book batteries.

"Anything with a memory has a battery, and we pride ourselves in making those available to the public," said Kennedy. "We are a service oriented company who is unique because it's a store for everyone. There's a battery for everyone. The store is something to see, and we invite all to come in a visit with us at our new location."

The store hours are Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Batteries Plus is open Sundays from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m.

Batteries Plus is located at 6615 Calhoun Memorial Hwy. For more information, call 306-7811.