Iowa State Surplus has all one’s needs, from lab equipment and university merch to affordable cars. The store is open to the public from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. every Wednesday at 925 Airport Road.
The Surplus manager, Curtis Hardman, maintains a sharp eye on inventory and encourages department heads to call the store if they’re looking for something specific.
Maddy Negley, Molly Schlotfeldt and Dominic Scudieri went to the surplus store together Sept. 10 to get supplies for a project. All three are fifth-year architecture students at Iowa State University.
With cheap prices and random stock, the Surplus store guarantees a successful trip for any art student looking for material.
“When you walk in there, there’s a whole electronic section,” Schlotfeldt said. “They have stuff that is out of storage, items that are completely functional, all of varying price ranges. They have monitors, clothes, a whole garage in the back with furniture.”
The Surplus Store’s inventory is also available to check online before visiting. New stock is also regularly posted on their Facebook, X account and GovDeals where you can view and place bids on the auctioned material in real time.
“It’s obviously super green,” Scudieri said. “They take all the junk from ISU, they repurpose it, then whatever they don’t sell, they try to scrap as much as they can. Old broken dressers, for example, were deconstructed and sold as scrap wood you can use for whatever now.”
The store acts as an outlet mall, selling Iowa State apparel for game day, uniforms for those who work on campus and furniture.
“It was like a bizarre, thrifting run,” Negley said. “Some of it was like, oh, I could get this at the Apple store, or I could get this in my grandma’s basement,”
Iowa State sends old dormitory appliances to ISU Surplus at discounted rates. They also send unusual collectables, like portions of the previously used Hilton Coliseum court. State Gym recently invested in new weight racks, sending the used ones to Surplus for public sale.
$1.2 million was returned to university departments in sales of excess material. In 2025, more than 217,000 pounds of scrap metal were recycled.
In the market for an item and not sure where to start? Consider Iowa State Surplus for an economical and environmentally friendly choice.
Additional info can be found here.
