One of two family-owned Hallmark stores in North Huntingdon will close at the end of the month.
“For our family, it’s a real tearjerker, as well as for some in our community. This place is huge in people’s memories. That’s why we are so affected,” said Kathleen “Kitty” Mahosky of Penn Township, about the decision to close their Vargo’s Hallmark Shop in Norwin Town Square on Route 30.
What made it so emotional was that her father, the late Charles Vargo, opened the Hallmark Shop there in 1970, Mahosky said. He also helped to maintain the shopping center, paving the parking lot, shoveling snow and cutting the grass.
The decision to close the Norwin Town Square store rather than Vargo’s Hallmark Shop in the Norwin Hills Shopping Center at the eastern end of the township was due in part to the amount of development at that end of the Route 30 corridor, Mahosky said. There are more restaurants, banks, stores and gas stations in that section of Route 30 where the Pennsylvania Turnpike is located, she said.
She co-owns the two Hallmark stores in North Huntingdon and one at the Northern Lights Shopping Center in Baden, Beaver County, with her sister, Barbara Bence. A third sister, Deborah Tumino, worked at the Norwin Town Square store. They are among six children, all of whom worked in the stores.
The family also formerly owned stores in Irwin and Jeannette, said Mahosky, a Norwin High School graduate.
One loyal customer, Bill Priatko of North Huntingdon, stopped in the store Wednesday, telling workers he will miss it.
“It’s my favorite hangout. We’ve been here since you opened,” Priatko said, recalling how his late wife, Helen, would buy cards at the store.
The decision to close the store — the closing sale continues until July 31 — also is a reflection of the changes in the greeting card industry, particularly for the family-owned ones, Mahosky said.
While the U.S. greeting card industry generated roughly $5.75 billion in sales in 2023, about the same as in 2022, according to data from Grandview Research of San Francisco, several factors have hurt the industry since the 2008 recession, including the state of the economy.
As a result of inflation, families have less discretionary income to spend on cards and other merchandise in the store, Mahosky said.
“It hurts everyone in this market,” she said.
The stores had been a place where people would get a card to mark milestones in their lives and the lives of family members — birthdays, weddings, graduations and deaths.
Back when her father was running the business, he had built it up to a $2 million enterprise, Mahosky said. But now, an owner would need a chain of greeting card stores to survive, she said.
“It has a niche that will never die, but it will have fewer owners,” Mahosky said.
Joe Napsha is a TribLive reporter covering Irwin, North Huntingdon and the Norwin School District. He also writes about business issues. He grew up on Neville Island and has worked at the Trib since the early 1980s. He can be reached at jnapsha@triblive.com.