Andrea Markey
Northern News Services

Iqaluit (June 27/05) - Not one stick of the original Arctic Ventures building remains on the Iqaluit site.

Since Kenn Harper bought the business 20 years ago from Bryan Pearson, he and his staff have made significant changes.

Arctic Ventures celebrated 20 years under the ownership of Kenn Harper on June 20. Harper credits the success of the store to his employees over the years, including Nick Kavanagh who is seen here stocking the video section in 2004.

"We built a major addition on the back of the original store and then demolished the existing front and built a new one," he said.

The store grew from 5,000 square feet to 26,000 square feet, but he said not to expect it to get any bigger.

"It physically can't grow any more because it is surrounded by other buildings," he said.

The original store carried groceries and dry goods, but today it houses that as well as hardware, gifts, video rentals, a Radio Shack and Nunavut's only bookstore.

As a book collector and writer, the bookstore has been a pet of Harper's.

"It is very much a Northern bookstore, with as many Northern and Inuktitut language books as possible," he said.

The bookstore also carries one of Harper's own books, Give Me My Father's Body: The life of Minik, the New York Eskimo.

"It is only one of hundreds of books," he said.

Not quite retired, but attempting it, Harper is trying to indulge his travel bug and write as much as possible.

Though Harper is the owner, he is very hands-off the everyday happenings of the store.

"John Bens has been the manager for 20 years, and Paul Chouinard has been assistant manager for just as long," he said. "They are very capable. I would just get in the way."

A key to the success of the store has been the more than 25 staff members, he said.

"Staffing in the North is hard and the group we have now work very well together," he said.

Weather-related problems are also to be expected in the North, and the store has had its share over the 20 years, said manager John Bens.

"We lost part of the roof to wind one time, but we have only closed two days in 20 years due to weather-related problems," he said.