Off Greene Street is a big building that is home to Modville – Home of The Porch Junkies, owned and operated by Amy Keiderling about a year ago. With right around 6,000 square feet, you can’t miss the big building that holds 50s, 60s and 70s vintage furniture. Just look for the orange door at the front of the building to enter this amazing space.

Before opening Modville, Amy was a project manager in Des Moines. Although she made good money, it wasn’t what she truly wanted to spend her time doing. Her partner, Keith, is a custom car painter. Together they began to custom paint aluminum porch chairs for couples. In one year, they painted upwards of 70 chairs. That’s how they found their name of Porch Junkies – they were focusing on revamping junk that went on porches.

After painting those 70 chairs Keith decided he wanted to go back to working on cars, and so began Amy’s focus on personal shopping for people. They used a small home in Johnston to stage rooms for college students, new homeowners, recent retirees and everybody in between.

Amy says that she jokes her business is in the witness protection program – simply because few people from the Adel area know about her. She typically gets one of three responses when people stop in. “We didn’t know you were here,” “My grandparents had something like this,” or “I should never have gotten rid of that.” Amy has used Facebook as her sole means of advertisement. Within one year she has grown from 1,000 likes on Facebook to 14,000. Being a small business owner Amy has realized that she has to be wise with her money and choose what will get her the most bang for her buck. By focusing her advertisements online, she has brought in people from all around the midwest. This includes Omaha, Kansas City,

Being a small business owner, Amy has realized that she has to be wise with her money and choose what will get her the most bang for her buck. By focusing her advertisements online, she has brought in people from all around the Midwest. This includes Omaha, Kansas City, Chicago and Minneapolis. When people visit Adel, they ask for advice on where to eat, shop, spend the night, and other activities to do. Amy tries to keep people in the area, so she suggests local businesses as answers to these questions.

Amy has pickers that work for her of all ages, but those are the only real employees she has. She and Keith are the only people who work at Modville full-time. Kevin Moll has an area in Modville that he uses to restore and renovate audio systems. Recently he has made consoles that can be hooked up to Bluetooth from your phone. Kevin’s business is called Skylabs, and he can help service (or renovate) multiple things you can dream of.

If you visit Modville and find something you love – buy it then. The turn-around time is quick, and it might not be at the store if you don’t snatch it up. However, if that does happen, list your specific item of interest in the Wishbook. Amy will send her pickers out to find exactly what you’re looking for, at any budget.

Amy has had difficulties owning her own business, such as working seven days a week and knowing where to spend her money, but she’s found that her friends and family are always willing to help her. Her title is not just owner; she also does all the marketing, staging, loading, unloading, cleaning and banking for Porch Junkies. She wouldn’t give that up, though, because she has met awesome people that have turned into some of her best friends. “When I went on vacation in September I realized that I had worked 355 days in a row.”

The goals for Modville in 2017 include getting a website and growing her use of social media such as Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat. Long term, she would like to open a small boutique in Des Moines to give a sneak peak of what she has in her Adel store.

This holiday season Modville hopes to host a canned food drive to help the food pantry in Adel. Customers that bring in food will get a small discount card to the shop. Overall, Amy believes “Why buy new when slightly used will do?”