Page 35 - Indulge April/May 2017
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customer service runs in the family family bonds
Cantelmi Hardware
Photos by Sarah Evans that many of them were flocking to a well-stocked, service-
Rick Cantelmi, owner of Cantelmi Hardware, is the third generation to work oriented hardware store to get what they needed for DIY
at the business. His son is soon to join in the family business. projects, renovations and repairs that so many of them were
confidently tackling at home.
By Jack Romig
Cantelmi’s was also making a place for itself as a
No business can last 95 years without navigating the hardware provider to major entities such as Lehigh University
shoals of hard economic times — probably more and the City of Bethlehem. Growth eventually pushed the
than once. For Cantelmi Hardware, the first big challenge business out of the first location to a bigger place just a few
happened when the U.S. economy tanked during the Great doors down the street. It eventually brought on the opening of
Depression, and founder Placido Antonio Cantelmi had to a second, much larger store in Forks Township.
be flexible and maintain customer loyalty if the doors were
going to stay open. Growth put most members of the family to work in the
stores at one time or another. Rick’s brother Phil learned the
“People still tell me about how my grandfather — people trade he follows now in North Carolina, handling outdoor
called him Patsy — helped their families in hard times,” said power equipment, as a young man in the family business.
Rick Cantelmi, at 62 years of age the third generation of his
family to run this durable Lehigh Valley enterprise. Their sister, Tina Bradford of Bethlehem, works for
a company that does online marketing, and Cantelmi
Patsy, Rick said, realized that survival meant Hardware is one of her accounts. At 87, their mother Lillian
diversification, which at the time required selling apples still takes care of the bookkeeping for the Lehigh University
or apple presses or many other unconventional goods in a account — and why not? “They’ve been a client since
store that had been a conventional hardware location. It also before I was born,” Rick said.
meant generosity. “Say somebody needed some glass to fix
a broken window when things were tough, he might just let Staying light on your feet
them have it — and he’d ask them to remember.”
As Patsy recognized long ago, success in retail demands
“And when World War II came along and Bethlehem Steel the ability to adapt. In the 1970s, that entailed responding
made the town boom, they did remember.” to the energy crunch with chain saws for people wanting to
cut their own wood and economical kerosene stoves. Late in
An immigrant’s dream the 20th century, the emergence of big-store hardware chains
knocked many mom-and-pop stores out of business.
Patsy was an Italian immigrant with a strong dedication
to family. “I used to spend a lot of time with him,” said his “We did not get shellacked by that,” Rick said. “It
grandson. Rick Cantelmi treasures photos of himself with mattered that building supply was not a major part of
his grandfather. He also prizes an envelope inscribed “Rick’s our business. It’s really hard to compete on that with
Pay,” in which, as an 8-year-old, he received 25 cents for his somebody like Lowe’s or Home Depot.” Because changes
first work at the original shop on 4th Street in Bethlehem. were anticipated and the business had already transitioned
— “from hardware and paint to hardware and outdoor
By the time Rick’s dad Louis took over from Patsy in equipment,” Rick said — working in a different environment
1959, Cantelmi’s had become a thriving business. In postwar was manageable.
America, a generation of American men and women had
internalized a can-do approach. It was hardly surprising Changes at the business will make Rick’s son Patrick
the fourth generation there. “He’s coming in full time,
which fulfills a lifetime dream for me,” Rick said. Patrick
will be in charge of the latest major change in the way
Cantelmi’s does business. “We’ll make the full inventory of
the store available to buy online,” Rick said “People will be
able to have things shipped or they can order them to pick
up in just a few hours.”
“Other changes are coming — often we’re still figuring
out what they’ll be. In the industry, we’re seeing a lot of
improvements to old items. We used to sell levels with a
bubble. Now they’re all electronic, and the prices have gone
way down. It’s happening with power tools, too.”
“Our job is to keep the customer happy, and we never
stop looking for ways to do that,” he said. “I do love to go to
work every day.”
