PLYMOUTH -- Another family-owned furniture store in our area is going out of business.
This is the first week of the liquidation sale at Fainberg's Furniture in Plymouth. It has been a fixture in that Luzerne County community for 107 years but that is coming to an end soon.
A fixture on Main Street in Plymouth is now plastered with going out of business and liquidation sale signs. Inside Fainberg's Furniture, customers are looking for deals and employees are preparing to say goodbye.
"It's hard to say goodbye, you get choked up when you talk about it,even."
Salesman Mel Materazzi has been working with customers for 43 years. The store opened in 1907.
A photo of founder Max Fainberg is on the wall, but now current owner Stan Fainberg has decided it's time to go.
“It's tough,” said Materazzi. “Oh, I'm going to miss it. Sure, I am. I worked for Mr. Fainberg and he was a great boss, treated us well, never had any problems.”
After more than a century, this place has furnished thousands of rooms in the Wyoming Valley including Barbara Keener's house.
“If you need a lamp or a mirror, you just run down here to get it,” Keener said.
“This is where the grandparents would come and buy, where children would come and buy. There's probably people that have furniture in their house from this store that's an antique,” said Fainberg manager Jon Preston.
This is the just the latest story about a locally owned furniture store in our area going out of business. At Fainberg’s, they say that's just a sign of the times and the economy around here.
“It's a shame. I think that's our environment today and our economy, the bigger box stores, people shopping on line even for furniture,” said William Feudale of Berwick.
Customers taking advantage of the going-out-of-business prices hate to see a locally owned business go.
“Yeah, but I'm glad of the bargains. I need a new mattress and i'm Going to get one,” laughed Keener.
"There's one thing the fainberg family would like to say and that's ‘thank you for 107 years of business,'" Preston added.
Fainberg's hasn't determined an exact date for closing. That depends on how the going-out-of-business sale goes.