After nearly 30 years, and 11 years after they came out of retirement to save their former customers, Pat and Nick Dimitroff said it’s time to retire and close their Bath Township furniture store.
“We want to enjoy life. We’re going to work a little bit. We want to do some volunteer work, play a little golf and do a little fishing,” said Nick, 72.
Added Pat, 66: “And hold some baby granddaughters.”
The Dimitroffs have brought in a liquidation company to sell heavily discounted new inventory and fine furniture from their two warehouses.
No more special orders will be taken on furniture, but the Dimitroffs said all special orders already in will be fulfilled, most by the end of September.
They hope to close Dimitroff’s Furniture and Design within 75 days to 90 days, by the end of October at the latest.
But first, they want to say goodbye to longtime customers, many of whom have become friends.
Customer and friend
Christine Fleissner has been a customer for nearly 30 years.
“When we moved into this house, we didn’t have any furniture,” Fleissner said of her Bath Township home. “Probably every 30 days, we got a new piece of furniture, if not more than that.”
Fleissner recalls going to see Pat Dimitroff every Wednesday at the store when Fleissner was pregnant with one of her daughters to look through catalogs. That daughter is now an OB/GYN resident and has become a Dimitroff’s customer herself.
While Fleissner said she will miss the Dimitroffs and their business, she knows that the furniture she has bought will last a lifetime.
“If they wouldn’t have bought it for their own home, or their children’s homes, they certainly weren’t going to sell it to you. They were taking care of their customers like family,” she said.
Fleissner said she and her husband became such good friends with the Dimitroffs that they bought a house in Florida near them. They bought furniture from Dimitroff’s to furnish that house, too.
The Dimitroffs had hoped to sell the store, but found no buyers. Most potential buyers wanted the Hudson couple to loan them money, which wasn’t an option.
Back on the job
In 2005, the Dimitroffs came out of retirement three years after selling their business, then called Traditions Home Furnishings, to a longtime employee. Traditions customers were left hanging when the new owner abruptly closed the stores on Ghent Road and Medina Road, citing debts.
The Dimitroffs said they couldn’t see their longtime customers hurt, so they reopened the business at the 981 Ghent Road location under Dimitroff’s. They lost money — about a quarter of a million dollars — making good on orders for customers, they said.
“We were embarrassed by what happened,” said Nick Dimitroff. “We came back and we had a moral obligation, though we had no legal obligation. We took care of everybody.”
Plans fall through
Nick said he and his wife had hoped to sell the business again within two to three years of returning in 2005, or perhaps have one of their grown daughters, Tammy, take over. But the recession hit in 2008, which was difficult, Nick said. Tammy was ready to take over the business, but she became a mother and her husband got a job offer in Florida.
Pat said she knew running the store was not her daughter’s dream.
Said Nick: “She could have handled the business. I didn’t want to put her into a seven-day-a-week job.”
Keeping a successful family-owned furniture store is also becoming increasingly hard, with competition from chain retail stores and the internet, Nick said.
The couple has sold the approximately 1.75 acres the business sits on to a real estate investment company and is under a confidentiality agreement, so they cannot disclose what may happen to the land.
The building — actually 12 different additions over the years — will be torn down.
Pat said she won’t be able to watch that.
Store’s final days
In the meantime, they will both be in the store, Pat more than Nick, to continue to sell and say goodbye to customers.
About 10 employees remain with the company, some who have been with the family for 30 years. Several will retire, and the Dimitroffs groomed two of the warehouse employees to run their own furniture business and gave them their equipment. They are also hoping to help a few other employees find other jobs.
They are planning to relocate to Florida, though they are considering buying a condo in Ohio for a few months out of the year.
Fleissner said the Dimitroffs deserve their retirement.
Said Nick: “We want to leave with dignity, take care of everybody and leave on an upbeat note with everybody.”
Betty Lin-Fisher can be reached at 330-996-3724 or blinfisher@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her @blinfisherABJ on Twitter or www.facebook.com/BettyLinFisherABJ.