NORTHAMPTON — Piece by piece, Serio’s Market came apart on Saturday afternoon. A day after the 115-year-old neighborhood grocery store closed its doors Friday, customers were invited to purchase mementos like signs, shelving units and boxes — now relics of an era gone by.
Though the shelves were mostly empty, Serio’s was bustling with customers who came to bid the shop farewell. The store sold the memorabilia in hopes of raising some money to pay off local vendors.
For one customer, it was an aisle sign. For another, a ceramic turkey. Several wire shelving units found new owners. Washboards, green wooden boxes and vinegar bottles were all carried away.
What the items were didn’t matter so much, said former owner Gary Golec, what mattered was that they were a part of the grocery store.
“It’s a little piece of Serio’s,” Golec said.
Golec and his team made the decision to close Serio’s last Monday. The store faced mounting financial burdens, slow winter sales and costly broken equipment. A lawsuit filed last fall alleged the business owes $32,349 to Bozzuto’s Inc. of Cheshire, Connecticut, the Gazette reported in November.
The community stepped in to try and save Serio’s, to no avail. Northampton Radio Group hosted a “cash mob” at the beginning of the year to encourage customers to shop at Serio’s, and a GoFundMe page collected contributions, the Gazette previously reported.
“We’ve been through a lot,” Golec said. “It shows people really care about the business, but not enough people cared about us. The shopping dynamic has changed over the years, who knows what all the reasons are.”
As the store buzzed with activity Saturday, customers and former employees reflected on the loss of the State Street outpost. Serio’s Pharmacy, which shares a building with the grocery store, will stay open.
Jill Lesko, of Northampton, purchased a blue “Aisle 5” sign, which she plans to put on her porch. Lesko had been coming to Serio’s since she was a student at St. Michaels School. “Let’s just say forever,” she said with a laugh.
Lesko also purchased a chalkboard-style sign with the store’s coffee offerings on it, which her daughter will give to a friend as a gift. Lesko felt like she needed to come and support the business, she added.
Joy Turner, of Northampton, began working at Serio’s in September. Though she came to manage the books, she described herself as a “jack of all trades.”
“When I got here, it was for bookkeeping,” Turner said, adding that the store was clearly in financial trouble. “We knew. We tried, we fought, we struggled … We were putting Band-Aids on a gaping wound.”
Golec was under intense stress, Turner said, especially after his wife Christina Cavallari died suddenly in 2014.
“He had to take care of himself,” Turner said of the store’s closing. “It was like a huge weight was lifted off of him.”
David Hulley, of Northampton, stood by the butcher counter Saturday afternoon and watched as customers took turns signing a Serio’s banner with a permanent marker.
When asked if he would miss Serio’s, Hulley didn’t say a word. Instead, he began to cry.
“Does that answer your question?” Hulley asked.
Three of Hulley’s seven children worked at Serio’s over the years. He had been coming to the store since 1984, and made his final purchase on Friday. Hulley didn’t plan on buying any Serio’s memorabilia on Saturday, he said, because he already had some in his fridge.
“I still have some ham left at home,” Hulley said with a smile.
On the other side of the butcher counter, employees cried as they read more than a dozen cards and letters from former customers.
“That’s what gets us like this,” said former employee Carlos Garcia, wiping away tears as he read a handwritten letter on yellow paper. Golec added he had many more notes stacked on the dashboard in his truck.
Garcia, of Northampton, was a Serio’s employee for more than three years. He said the store is his family, and the closure felt “heartbreaking.” He doesn’t know what’s next for him, he said.
“Unemployment, let’s be real,” Garcia said. “But I stayed here until the end. This is the kind of place you don’t plan to leave. You don’t leave until it’s done.”
Now that the shop’s 115-year run has come to a close, Golec said he’ll dust off his Class B commercial driver’s license and go back to truck driving.
“I’ll let somebody else be the boss for a while,” he said.
Golec’s main priority, he stressed, is paying back the vendors who stocked Serio’s shelves for so many years.
“I have a lot of small, local vendors, and I’m going to pay them every dime I can. You pay off what you can with what you’ve got,” Golec said. “I tell them, ‘I’m not gonna leave you hanging.’”
Stephanie Murray can be reached at stephaniemur@umass.edu