Click here for a schedule of our art and education conferences and workshops.

Our partnerships provide valuable community resources to educators throughout the region. More info...

Read articles about United Art and Education that have been published in area newspapers.

See the press releases sent to newspapers, radio and television stations announcing special events and more!

February, 2006
By Brandy Korman
Since 1960, United Art and Education has been supplying the artistic needs of customers ranging from professional artists and children to elementary teachers and universities.

“We have all kinds of art supplies and creative products for professional artists all the way down to beginning artists,” said director of marketing Angie Leach from the Fort Wayne corporate office. “We also feature products like homework helpers and other things that help with learning and are fun for kids,” she said.

United Art, formerly known as Creative Teaching, relocated its McKinley Avenue store to the Indian Ridge shopping plaza in Mishawaka in 2004 to make room for their full line of art and educational products. “The company acquired the Creative Teaching stores that were located in Mishawaka and Goshen,” said Leach. “We consolidated both of those stores to the location in the Indian Ridge Plaza.”

Leach said the company is continuing to make improvements to their locations and is also planning to expand further into the Indiana and Ohio regions.

“We opened up our second store in Indianapolis is 1995,” said Leach. “Ever since then we have been expanding and introducing our stores into new markets,” she said.

The business recently opened a store in Sharonville, Ohio, a suburb of Cincinnati, making this its seventh location. The Sharonville location offers a complete line of fine art materials and education resources. Leach said the plan is for all the locations to carry the full line of products.

“All of our locations carry the same products with the exception of our store in Dublin, Ohio,” said Leach. However, we are relocating that store to a bigger location, so eventually that facility will carry the full line of products as well,” she said.

The products currently offered include everything from clay and sculpture materials to fiber arts and easels. The store also offers teaching aids for elementary teachers and parents including classroom decorations, name badges, notepads and globes.

“Our prices vary,” said Leach, “We offer products like incentives that cost as little as a dollar, to things like kilns that cost as much as $10,000.”

One contributing factor to the success of the business is its mail-order division.

“Our mail-order division serves the entire country,” said Leach. “We send our catalog to schools all over the country, although the mail-order side is more oriented toward art as opposed to the teaching side.”

Schools interested in purchasing bulk supplies such as construction paper and pencils or anyone interested in purchasing products for organizations use the mail-order division the most, said Leach.

“There are certainly schools in the area that purchase from us,” said Leach. “Individual teachers go in the store and sort through teacher resource books and purchase things for the classroom, or schools order things through the mail-order catalog,” she said.

“We continue to grow every year,” said Leach. “Hopefully we will continue to do so in the future.”

Visit United Art at www.UnitedNow.com for a complete list of products.

^Top