WATSONVILLE - Owner David Baker kept busy Thursday at Baker Bros. Furniture, answering customers' questions and ringing up sales.
Bargain hunters browsed showrooms packed with sofas, recliners, dining and bedroom sets, washers and dryers and kitchen appliances.
Outside, on the windows, fluorescent paint screamed "liquidation."
After more than four decades in business at Brennan and Fifth streets, the downtown institution will close in a matter of weeks. Word of the final sale sparked the unusual weekday rush.
"What we have been experiencing is sad," said Baker, looking away as emotion edged into his voice.
Sad for the downtown, too, to see another storefront go dark after the shuttering of Gottschalks department store and other smaller businesses in recent years.
Another furniture store, Ramos Furniture Home Store, opened earlier this year a couple blocks away at 555 Main St.
But Mayor Daniel Dodge said it's tough to see Baker Bros. go, especially now when Sacramento is considering taking away redevelopment and enterprise zones, the only tools the city has to foster economic growth.
Watsonville's not alone, he said, pointing to the news of Borders planned closing in Santa Cruz. But if the state does move forward with the takeaways, city growth could come to a standstill, he said.
Beyond that, Baker's put his energies into not only his business, but his community, Dodge said.
"It's terrible these hard times are forcing people out of business, out of being involved. That's the part we won't recover from. That's really the greater loss," he said.
Baker said the furniture business hasn't turned a profit in four years and though the appliance side was making money, it wasn't enough to carry the store.
Baker and wife Debbie had worked at the store for 20 years before buying it from his father, Bob, in 2007. Even then, the couple recognized the challenge. About the same time, another furniture store on Main Street closed as the housing boom collapsed and recession hit.
Sales were in decline, Debbie Baker said back then.
But David Baker said the store had weathered downturns before, and he was hopeful it would withstand this one as well. But the recession and the foreclosure crisis, which has hit Watsonville particularly hard, proved too much.
"Furniture is a very discretionary purchase," he said. "People can put off buying a sofa six months or a year."
Steve and Christina Vargas were among the shoppers Thursday. They said they had spent the past year looking for just the right sofa for their Watsonville home and were hoping to find something they liked at a bargain price.
"It's a shame, though," Steve Vargas said. "The store's been here for 40 years. You'd like to see something like that keep going. You hate to see such a good business go.
The closing also means 10 employees will be out of a job. At one time, the store employed twice that many, and Baker said ironically, he'd have to hire some back to help with the liquidation.
But for Charlie Flores, who's delivered Baker Bros. furniture for 25 years, it's the end of the line. His wife, Debbie Baker's sister, lost her Monterey County teaching job last year. Asked what he'd do, he shrugged.
"I don't know. I'll look for a job," said Flores, 61. "But it's going to be hard looking for a new job. If you say you are 55 or 60, they don't want to hire you."
David Baker couldn't say what's next for him, either. He and Debbie met, married and raised their children while working at the store. His father opened the business in 1969 with brothers James and Odell. Baker family portraits line the wall of the office. Baker said he told his father, who helps out two Saturdays a month, not to come in for awhile.
Baker, 55, said he has to stay open long enough to make good on commitments he's made to Brand Source, a purchasing association he joined so he could reduce the size of his warehouse. He said that could take 60 to 90 days, and maybe another 30 days to ensure deliveries to customers.
Also up in the air is what to do with the two adjoining buildings. He leases the 1930s-era Spanish-Moorish style building on Brennan Street that houses the furniture business from his father, and owns the smaller appliance store front on Fifth Street.
Baker, who lives in Aromas, said Watsonville is his community. He's built relationships with other businesses, such as Pajaro Dunes, and he's been active in business and service groups and on city committees. He has thousands of customers in his files. He'll miss all those connections.
"It's like a new page I'm starting," Baker said. "I don't know what the book's going to tell me yet."
Source: http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_17474445?nclick_check=1
