Titusville, Fla. — Running a hardware store isn’t rocket science. But for the team at Ace Hardware Titusville, rocket science is never too far removed from the business equation.

Within plain view of the store’s parking lot across the wide Indian River sits the Kennedy Space Center and the Space Shuttle launch pad. Space launches are part of the culture here, and the nation’s space exploration apparatus is part of the customer base for the store, which has sent merchandise into orbit at least once.