For 60 years, Newhall Hardware was the place to buy that tiny screw, odd-size nuts and bolts or even the perfect doorstop. But the iconic neighborhood store – which struggled to survive in an era of big-box retailers with their acres of parking and convenient locations – is closing its doors reports the Daily News.
“It’s kind of sad,” said 56-year-old Newhall resident Steve Minetti. “It’s been here so long.”
Minetti was one of about 40 customers waiting for the store’s doors to open at 10 a.m. Tuesday for the first day of the liquidation sale.
Some customers came for the discounted prices. Others came for old times’ sake. The store opened in 1947 and celebrated its 60th anniversary in August.
Neon signs – “Must sell to the Bare Walls!” and “Closing Forever!” – were posted throughout the store.
The somber mood inside the store was countered with employees scurrying around helping customers who jostled down the narrow aisles holding on to buckets that serve as the store’s shopping baskets.
A yellow pad of paper sat on the front counter, urging customers to sign in and leave a message. But the paper was blank Tuesday morning as mourners preferred to give their condolences to owner Victor Feany in person.
“It’s very difficult,” Feany said. “One of the things that makes it difficult is the close friends and family who are here.”
Feany’s mom, Dolly, 84, came from Placentia to give her son moral support and a hug.
“It’s really hard on him today,” she said Tuesday. “He has been here a long time.”
Feany started working at the store 33 years ago and bought it from the original owner, Don Guglielmino, nine years ago.
Feany had his eye on owning a hardware store since his toddler days, his mother said. His father took him to Newhall Hardware on the former San Fernando Road when he was just 3. The street was renamed Main Street last year in a city effort to rejuvenate the old downtown.
Read it here: Hard times in hardware doom 60-year-old shop