THEY'RE WILD ABOUT HARRY'S!

More than 1 million have visited the self-serve auto parts yard...

Reprinted from the Hazleton Standard~Speaker, October 31, 1999

BY JAMES QUIRK Jr.
STANDARD SPEAKER

A junkyard is usually a place for old vehicles that don't run anymore.

The cars and trucks are strewn about in a helter-skelter fashion. Someone with an older-model vehicle in need of a particular part is usually fit to be tied after trying to find it in a junkyard.

A chaotic state of affairs is not the name of the game at Harry's U-Pull-It in Hazle Township, where someone needing a car part can locate it easily and quickly and all by themselves.

But is it a junkyard? No, according to co-owner Joseph Kress.

For dying motor vehicles, Harry's U-Pull-It is a state-of-the-art rest home.

A subsidiary of the adjoining Kress Auto Wreckers, Harry's is owned and operated by Joseph "Buddy" Kress and his son, Joseph Kress. Both businesses are situated on a 200-acre site, located just west of West Hazleton in the Green Ridge section of Hazle Township.

Joseph Kress talks about how and why Harry's U-Pull-It came to be.

What makes Harry's different from other businesses, and from other "junkyards", is that customers, who pay a $1 entrance fee, locate and extract the part by themselves. They then pay a minimal fee for each part when leaving.

"All the parts here are $100 or less," the younger Joseph Kress said. "You can walk out of here with a whole motor for as low as $69.95."

More than a million people have visited Harry's U-Pull-It since it opened in 1991, he said.

To explain how Harry's came about, Kress - a third-generation entrepreneur of cars and parts - turns back the clock to the 1920s, when Kress Auto Wreckers was Kress Auto Wreckers.

"Harry's is named after my grandfather and uncle," whom, Kress said, got the initial business off the ground.

Kress' great-grandfather's name was Joseph Harry Kress; his grandfather was Harry A. "Bud" Kress; his father, who is still running the business, is Joseph "Buddy" Kress; and his late uncle was Harry J. "Sonny" Kress.

Kress Auto Wreckers was established in the 1920s as a place to get rid of old cars, as well as one where people could obtain parts for their own vehicles, Kress explained.

There was no welfare system then, he said, and many people couldn't afford to buy a brand new car let alone pay a mechanic to install it.

Joseph Kress didn't get into the business until 1973, shortly after he graduated, he said.

Starting from the ground floor, he went through all the same growing pains associated with the business as his forefathers did before him.

It was in the late 1980s, he said, when it became increasingly evident that some changes had to be made with Kress Auto Wreckers.

Because the place had a mixture of new and old model vehicles, there was way too much work for Kress employees.

A sign that directs visitors to the cars they're looking for.

It wasn't feasible, he said, to send an employee searching for a car part for an older-model vehicle that was worth only a few bucks. In the same respect, it wasn't smart to let a customer look for the part themselves; by giving someone free reign on the grounds, there is always the risk a customer will end up taking something from a newer-model vehicle, and thus ruining it, he said.

"It was all one big yard," Kress said. "You couldn't send someone out with a customer then and sell him a part for just $10 when it cost you $25 just to send a serviceman with him."

So, to keep people out of the yard, and to separate the older vehicles from the newer ones, Harry's U-Pull-It was established on about half of the Kress plot.

Now, someone needing parts for a newer vehicle can go to the full-service Kress Auto Wreckers, and someone looking for parts to an older car or truck can find it at Harry's U-Pull-It.

Around the same time Harry's opened in 1991, actor Paul Reubens, better known as Pee-Wee Herman, was arrested in an X-rated movie theater on obscenity charges. This incident, according to Kress, began a no-holds-barred advertising campaign like none attempted before.

Harry's used the incident as a springboard to get people's attention by paralleling the actor's crime to the business title.

Comical commercials aside, Harry's is carrying on the tradition started by Kress' grandfather and uncle.

"It's a tribute to them," he said. "They tried to help people out back then, and that's what we're trying to do now."

All the older model vehicles that come into Harry's are - for safety and environmental reasons - drained of all fluids, and the gas tanks are removed and placed in the back seat.

While that isn't a state or federal requirement, Harry's does it to "remain one step ahead of the game," Kress said.

The fluid is drained in a special building, and is used to heat some of the facilities on the lot.

Each vehicle, after being cleared of all debris, is brought to the special section of the lot for that make and model.

For instance, Oldsmobiles can be found in one section, Chryslers in another, and foreign cars in yet another.

Every vehicle is then elevated to make it easy for someone to crawl underneath to pull a part out, Kress said.

The setup makes it easy for someone to find what they need, he said, and "without someone breathing down the back of their neck like in a salesman-type atmosphere."

Kress compares a visit to Harry's like a trip to the mall.

"You see a girl carrying a guy's toolbox... people come here and do their own thing," he said. "They walk in with a smile, and they walk out with a smile. Some people just come and pay the buck and walk around to see what we got."

There's even a food wagon on the lot for people to buy a hot dog and soda, he said.

An average of 150,000 people visit Harry's U-Pull-It every year. Half of them, he said, are from New York and other nearby states.

"People from the big cities are happy to drive here because they know they'll get what they want, and that the parts are very inexpensive," Kress said.

Thousands of older-model cars are arranged in rows, according to the manufacturer, at Harry's U-Pull-It in Hazle Township.

Right now, there are 10,000 cars on Harry's lot and about 400 on the full-service Kress Auto Wreckers lot.

And how does Harry's keep on top of its game?

"By always coming up with something new," Kress said. "I think it's our ability to change with the times that makes us successful."

For instance, a new aspect of the business is selling used cars on credit, he explained.

Everybody qualifies regardless of credit history, and depending on what the initial down payment is, the weekly payments can be as low as $25, he said.

On October 9, Harry's opened its newest location in Allentown, and there are plans in the works to expand into other areas as well, he said.

Harry's U-Pull-It and Kress Auto Wreckers are well-respected entities in national organizations like the Automobile Recycling Association and Pennsylvania Auto Recycling Trade Society, Kress said.

And the business has its own website - www.wegotused.com. Those visiting the web site can take a virtual helicopter ride over Harry's U-Pull-It and Kress Auto Wreckers.

But Kress stressed that it was the family members before him and the customers who really made the business what it is today.

"A lot of their ways were bestowed onto me," he said of his forefathers. "They always took care of people. But it was the people that really made it such a huge success."

Regarding the use of the names Harry and Joseph and the variations of Buddy in his family, Kress said it's like a tradition.

In fact, Kress' daughter is named "Joey".