Worcester Business Journal

8 Worcester Business Journal | October 2, 2017 | wbjournal.com A 235-year-old hardware store is the latest retailer to close downtown, even as Worcester seeks to bring new activity to Main Street Worcester loses legacy business BY GRANT WELKER Worcester Business Journal News Editor The folks at Tree House Brewing know a thing or two about craft brews. So when they needed a banking partner that knows a thing or two about helping businesses thrive, they called on us. It's what we've been doing for our entrepreneurial neighbors since 1850. How can we help your business? (800) 322-8233 countrybank.com/business PROUD. COMMUNITIES THAT MAKE BUSINESSES – – W E GO WA Y BACK WITH THE Member D IF Member FD IC I n today's retail world, a small hardware store has to compete not just with Home Depot and Lowe's Home Improvement but also with Amazon and other online options letting anyone buy nails, light bulbs and screwdrivers without getting off the couch. So what's a 235-year-old downtown Worcester hardware store to do? "We've had guys come in here in their 90s who'd say, 'I used to come in with my grandfather.'" - Mark Lannon, manager, Elwood Adams Hardware Those converging factors – along with an inconvenient Main Street loca- tion – were enough to force Elwood Adams Hardware to close in September, as the latest local example of a wide- spread retail trend favoring the Amazons and Walmarts much more than even deep-pocketed longtime retailers like Macy's and JCPenney. "That's changing times," said Mark Lannon, who's worked at Elwood Adams for his whole 35-year career. "It's inevitable." The hardware store has always been at the same location, at 156 Main St., first built by Daniel Waldo, according to the store, which calls itself the oldest business in Worcester and "probably the oldest hardware store in the nation." The building, which Lannon said was the city's first brick commercial build- ing, dates to 1830. The shop had several names over the years, but the same one since the late 1800s when it was named after an apprentice who owned it. Creating a personal connection Elwood Adams hasn't stayed entirely still. For years, it did make its products available online. But with about 16,000 items for sale, it took so long for Lannon to manually put each product on the website, it became unfeasible, and the store gave up its online efforts. People looking for the convenience of buying online has never been Elwood Adams's main clientele anyway. There have been cases of people asking for a product, getting a recommenda- tion and writing down a model number – just to end up buying it online. But more often, Lannon said, it has been those looking for a personal connec- tion, or maybe just buying from there because they simply always have. "We've had guys come in here in their 90s who'd say, 'I used to come in with my grandfather,'" Lannon said. The weeks leading up to the closing have brought a stream of wellwishers, who recalled long-ago trips to the store or the friendly service and rapport that's not so easy to find at much larger chains — never mind online. "When I was a little girl, my mom would bring me here all the time," said Carla Harris, a shopper whose own memories go back to the 1970s and '80s. Bill Quinn, a maintenance manager at the Worcester Police Department, has been a regular at Elwood Adams for 18 years for the police but far longer himself. He and Fran Neale, a manager and a 41-year employee, reminisced about long-gone Worcester landmarks. "It's that neighborhood feel," Quinn said. Mark Lannon, a 35-year manager at Elwood Adams Hardware, talks to a customer before the store closed permanently in September. P H O T O / E D D C O T E

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