Finkles Closing Its Doors In Lambertville After 107 Years In Business

LAMBERTVILLE, N.J. — After 107 years in business, “the world’s most unusual supply house” is closing its doors.

Following an extended clearance sale that began in November and ends on January 4, Finkles will be shutting its doors forever on Coryell Street.

An institution in town, city residents have come here for decades for their hardware needs, from loose nails and screws to their major electrical, plumbing and lighting needs.

After one last clearance sale on Saturday and a bagpipe sendoff, its iconic neon sign that has welcomed customers for decades above Coryell Street will go dark one last time.

(Jeff Werner/Patch)

(Jeff Werner/Patch)

“It’s very sad to me that this beautiful, special, incredible place that’s so unique and so valuable is coming to an end,” said Rachel Finkle who has owned and operated the store for the last 34 years. “The whole community will miss it, myself included.”

Finkles has been in continuous operation for more than a century, initially as a scrap yard, then as a supply house and eventually as a community hardware store where customers could purchase anything they needed from paint to power tools without going out of town to the “big boxes.”

Rachel took the reins of the business 34 years ago from her father, Abe, who inherited it from his father, Joseph, who started it as a scrap business 107 years ago.

Through three generations of Finkles, the business has changed with the times to meet the community’s needs morphing from that initial scrap yard to a business fixture on Coryell Street.

Rachel’s grandfather, Joseph, who founded the business, immigrated to the U.S. in the late 1890s from Ukraine. He started in Trenton as a peddler with a pack on his back going door to door selling what he could. He later moved to Lambertville where he bought property and established a scrap yard. Under his ownership the scrap yard expanded to include a supply house.

Abe Finkle, Joseph’s son, took over the supply business from his father. Abe, who was born in 1912, was the only one of five kids who stayed with the family business. He oversaw the expansion of the business to include hardware, lighting, plumbing and more.

Rachel, joined the business in 1990 working with her father at the store until his death in 1994 when she became the third generation to own and operate the store.

She took over operations at a challenging time for the local hardware store business with increased competition from big box retailers.

Rachel Finkle next to portraits of her father, Abe, and her grandfather, Joseph. (Jeff Werner/Patch)

“Initially pressure came from the big boxes in the early 90s. Then there was a plumbing supply chain that moved into Flemington and that took a lot of our plumbers. Now we compete on line. People buy everything on line whether it’s Wayfair or Amazon,” said Rachel, who struggled at times through her ownership to keep the business a float.

“There were definite traumatic periods when cash flow was tight. And I will not be sad to ever have that experience again,” she said. “The fact that we owned our own property meant that during tough times we didn’t pay ourselves a fair market value rent. And that’s the story of a lot of
family businesses,” said Rachel. “That’s how they stayed in business against big corporate competition.”

In a word, Saturday’s closing for Rachel will be “bittersweet.

“I’m happy that I’m not going bankrupt and it wasn’t forced upon me,” she said. “People came to me out of the blue interested in buying the property. So instead of fulfilling my worst nightmare that I couldn’t pay bills, make payroll, close the business and be stuck with property taxes that’s not the way it’s ending and I’m relieved. It’s sad for me, though, that the business wasn’t strong enough to continue for the next generation.”

When she was approached four years ago by a buyer who was interested in acquiring all three properties - the main store, the lighting store, the warehouse and parking lot - she thought long and hard before making a decision.

“I thought, ‘When am I ever going to see this opportunity again? We worked together. We closed the deal and I leased it back to continue doing business for a few more years,” she said.

After a lifetime of living and breathing the business, Rachel now finds herself in a unique position of pondering life beyond Finkles and reinventing herself.

“I’m finally going to take care of me instead of the business. I can’t remember the last time I got on a bike or took care of my fitness or traveled. I think I’m going to write my family story about the business and stimulate parts of my brain that haven’t been stimulated in years. Maybe I’ll go back to pottery, gardening, and cooking.”

(Jeff Werner/Patch)

(Jeff Werner/Patch)

As she prepares for life after Finkles, what’s her message to her longtime customers and employees?

“Gratitude and appreciation,” said Rachel. “Everyone - our customers, our employees - brought their special personalities and character to the business. It was a sense of community. It was like a living breathing organism that was created by everybody who worked here and the customers who were regulars.

“What made Finkles extra special were its employees, many of whom spent years, if not decades with the store,” she continued. “Consequently they had extensive product knowledge and really took the time to help the customers. I used to joke that the one thing we didn’t specialize in was the blank stare,” a subtle reference to the puzzled looks customers sometimes get from the big box employees."

As for her customers, Finkle said, "Thirty-four years is a long time to know the same customers and to know everything they are going through whether it’s a joy or sorrow. It’s been a window into the community for me that I’m going to miss,” she said.

Her final message to the community?

“Come in for one final goodbye - a nostalgic trip down memory lane - and take home a piece of Finkles to remember,” said Rachel.

Finkles will be open on Saturday, Jan. 4 from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. before closing its doors forever.