By Mike Perry, Rome News-Tribune Staff Writer<\/p>\n
The Swanns are saying farewell to their 55-year-old family store, Jack Robbins Furniture.<\/p>\n
Jack Robbins, affectionately remembered as \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bargain Jack\u00e2\u20ac\u009d by his customers, first opened the business on Avenue C in 1952 and later moved to Broad Street.
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\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153He gave away a live monkey,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Dale Swann, one of the present owners, recalled of his father-in-law\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s first opening. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It came with the store, so he gave it away. The funny thing is, the woman who got it came back two weeks later and wanted to give it back.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Beth Swann, Robbins\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 daughter, and her husband say their decision to cease operations at the 110 Broad St. spot arrives at a time of increasing competition with major retailers and an offer they cannot refuse.<\/p>\n
The couple said Friday they have a buyer for the building. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It definitely helped our decision-making,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Dale Swann said.<\/p>\n
Local businessman John Massey, who owns The Diamond Store on Glenn Milner Boulevard, confirmed Friday that he is buying the building.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I am going to move my jewelry store there,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I needed a bigger building. I like Broad Street. And that block still has some available parking.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Massey said he plans to subdivide the 16,000-square-foot space to allow for an undisclosed retailer and another tenant that he \u00e2\u20ac\u0153can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t reveal yet.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
But for the Swanns, the closure of their family store is bittersweet.<\/p>\n
Beth Swann said she worked for her parents for more than 40 years. She recalled playing in the store as a child when it was located at 510 Broad St.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Daddy sold tricycles. I can remember riding tricycles down the aisle,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bargain Jack\u00e2\u20ac\u009d moved the family business five blocks down on Broad Street more than a decade later.<\/p>\n
The Swanns took it over more than a decade ago, with her handling the bookkeeping and furniture buying and Dale Swann working the showroom sales.<\/p>\n
The couple decided to retain the store\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s name to honor her father.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153One of the special things about it was always being able to work with my family,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Beth Swann said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We never considered that we had customers. We had friends who came here over the years.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s definitely an emotional move,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she added. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a lot of work. But it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a lot of fun.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Mike Perry, Rome News-Tribune Staff Writer The Swanns are saying farewell to their 55-year-old family store, Jack Robbins Furniture. Jack Robbins, affectionately remembered as \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bargain Jack\u00e2\u20ac\u009d by his customers, first opened the business on Avenue C in 1952 and later moved to Broad Street.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-furniture-indonesia-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4521\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}