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Marsden's has delivered 'award-winning' service since 1963 (9 photos)

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If you have ever been lucky enough to win anything in Barrie, chances are your award came from Marsden’s Distinctive Awards.

Currently located at 4 Alliance Blvd. in Unit 6, the famous awards, recognitions and identification shop has been there since the early 70s, but Marsden’s has been around since 1963. The founder, Don Marsden, originally did all the work out of his home, but current owner Dallace Degagner says that the story is when the phone calls for orders were happening into the late evening, Mrs. Marsden said it was time to get a shop.

“My wife and I bought the store in 2012 from the people who purchased it from Don and Mr. Marsden came in here and told us that when he opened it here in the seventies, St. Vincent was just a dirt road with farmland behind us on what’s now Bell Farm Road,” said Degagner. “The population back then was probably 20,000 people and there had to have been a need for it, so good on him for getting this started and working so hard to build it.”

With Barrie’s population now closing in quickly on 150,000 people and with countless sports and leisure organizations throughout the city, trophies and awards have never been more on demand. Degagner and his wife Jessie Thomson never thought they’d be in the awards business but when the opportunity arose, they took the leap and haven’t regretted since.

“My wife and I are originally from Sudbury and wanted to settle down this way together,” said Degagner. “We didn’t want to do the commute to Toronto and when we saw this available we figured we’d buy into our jobs and do something interesting together. I never saw myself as a trophy maker but we love this; we get to work together and provide long-lasting memories for kids and adults.”

Marsden’s doesn’t really have a busy season as there are not only many local sports happening year-round, but also businesses and personally crafted awards that are asked for. The couple are currently working on awards for a local hockey league that are, as like most on-ice sports, getting set to wrap up their season. The 38 year old former construction worker and salesman says that while their calendar is pretty booked with regulars every year, he loves the walk-ins who think they have unique needs.

“We do pretty much everything in town,” said Degagner. “All the leagues for kids and even adults league are done here. The regulars make their order and chat sometimes because we’ve just become friendly, but I like the guys that come in and are looking for that one trophy for their beer league or sports pool. They always act like it’s silly and they just throw out an idea thinking we’ve not heard of it, but we do that stuff all the time and truthfully, it’s a lot of fun to help a group out with an award that will be handed down year after year.”

While most think of trophies and awards when they hear Marsden’s, there is much more to what they do. The company also does items that one sees near every day but you’ve never thought about where it came from.

“The thing is I get kind of branded when I tell people that own the awards shop,” said Degagner. “Everyone thinks about the sports statues and trophies, but there is a whole other side that is massive for us. We do corporate awards too, which are usually the glass or acrylic, for businesses like Purolator, United Way, the Faris team and a lot of local stuff but it’s the signage that’s big. Door and desk plates for corporate positions or even for the local city hall; we do that too. People don’t realize when they see name badges that they have to come from somewhere; you can’t just go to Wal-Mart and buy them. We even do memorials for maybe park benches or tree-stakes; we really truly do everything here.”

With the business focus being on custom work, there is a lot of detail that goes into each item. The customer places the order which is planned out and set to computer with all the words needed and graphics. The couple also have to proof and reproof every item so it’s mistake-free. Everything is digitally set up and sent back to the customer for their final approval and even with all that work into it, Degagner and his wife get the orders out when they’re needed to be out.

“The options are astronomical’” says Degagner. “Thousands of fonts, thousands of images, so many shapes and sizes; it’s a lot easier now than it would have been years ago but I still use an old machine from time to time believe it or not. Certainly we do the traditional diamond engraving, laser and such but I even use the old pantograph machine sometimes. It’s a manual engraver and it was how it was done back in the fifties and sixties. Don Marsden used to sit at the thing and do 5,000 characters a day at times; it’s all done by hand. I use it a lot and am actually using it today for the new Barrie Fire Chief badges because it works better for that item. It goes to show that as far as we get with technology, the old machine still works just as well.”

With some orders being as big as 600 items each, the long hours and repetitive work might seem to be too daunting for just two people, but the owners are very happy with their connection to the community and enjoy every busy day.

“Its really cool to have folks my age come in to place an order and end up hearing that they have an awards from little league or tikes with the Marsden’s logo on it,” said Degagner. “That’s the special side of this; knowing we are a part of a staple in the community and providing memories for anyone who steps in the door.”

For more information on how to order from Marsden’s, check out their website or on Facebook at @marsdensawards.