INSIDE

You don’t have to go far for a bargain

Shoppers who were crushed when the Tsawwassen supermarket shuffle did away with the Bargain Store and Liquidation World, weep no more. Point Roberts now has its own bargain-hunters utopia. Sand Dollars, which opened in the old Blackberries location at Gulf Road and Marine Drive right before Christmas, has an ever-changing medley of deals to satisfy the most penny-pinching.

“It varies all the time,” said owner Jason McDougall. “We buy deals when people are closing and things like that. I bring new things in a couple times a week so it’s always changing.” On the shelves now you can find housewares, beauty supplies, CDs, pet and baby supplies. A deluge of crafter’s supplies is on the way. “I just bought a craft store inventory so we’ll be bringing in beads, eyes, pompoms, all sorts of things,” McDougall said.

Sand Dollars is an expansion of McDougall’s bargain store business in Canada, which includes the Bargain Castle in Coquitlam and McFrugals in Langley. He and his family moved to Point Roberts in March and started scouting around for a store location, looking to open a bargain store with a Point Roberts feeling. “It’s a little more boutique so it fits better with the environment here,” he said.

McDougall has plans to open more businesses on the Point. “I see lots of opportunity here, so near a big city,” he said. He hopes to develop a mini-storage on five acres he recently purchased next to the Point Roberts Marketplace.

Sand Dollars now employs three people and is open seven days a week, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekdays and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekends. “I didn’t have any expectations so I’m happy with it so far,” McDougall said. “I think it will grow slowly once people know it’s there.” .

BACK TO TOP