Vacarros Closing in Downtown Scarsdale

Vacarros Shoe Repair, one of the first businesses to open in downtown Scarsdale, will close at the end of August. Three generations of the Vacarro family kept the people of this town on their well-shod feet since 1929, the year of the stock market crash, and now, as the country faces another economic downturn, the family run shop is about to close its doors. The eight decades of the store traces a history of the country from the time of the arrival of waves of immigrants hoping to make their fortune and care for their families while becoming proud Americans to a time of uncertainty. The fate of the store has the fate of many mom and pop stores, here and throughout the country and reflects changes in buying habits, style, and mores.

The shop was founded by Donato Vaccaro, grandfather of the current owner Luke Vacarro. One of the first merchants in downtown Scarsdale, Vacarro signed a lease for the space with Rush Wilson’s grandfather and the Harwood Building remains in the Wilson family today. At that time, the Scarsdale Post Office was in the Harwood Building, occupying the space now held by retailer LF, and a grocer sold premium meats from another store in the building. According to Luke, his overworked grandfather died young in 1950 leaving the store to Luke’s father. Luke’s dad, who was 40 at the time, and the father of 13 children learned on the job. He also worked without rest and died leaving Luke to take over the family business at the tender age of 19. Though Luke dreamed of being a math teacher and basketball coach, he had to drop out of college to run the shop to support his widowed mother and 12 younger brothers and sisters.

Like his father, Luke learned on the job, first sweeping the store, then wrapping the shoes and later moving on to shoe shine, and repair. He was the man at the counter and the face of the Vaccaro family to the community. With the help of his family, including his sister Nikki Reno and his brother Justin, he has run the shop for 41 years, since 1970.

During these years, he pursued his love of coaching basketball, founding an AAU Girl’s Travel Basketball team that still operates today. When Scarsdale High School needed a girl’s basketball coach, parent’s drafted Vacarro, who said he would try it for a year in 1996 and ended up staying on for 15 years. To keep up with work at the shop he would often coach from 6 pm – 9 pm, and return to the shop after practice at night. During his career, he coached star players Hillary Howard of Scarsdale and Katrina Gaither of Mt. Vernon and continues to coach the AAU team today.

In the 1960’s, Vacarro’s sold pet food and supplies in addition to running the shoe repair. They kept three rhesus monkeys in a cage in the large front display window to entertain customers. On one occasion one of the monkeys got out of the cage at night and when the shop opened in the morning the monkey was found sitting behind the register chewing on a piece of leather. Another day, a monkey escaped and was spotted in a tree at the Scarsdale Post Office on Chase Road. The Fire Department needed to bring in a ladder to get him down. Scarsdale alumni often return to town for their reunions and stop in at Vacarros to look for the monkeys.

So why is the shop closing now after 82 years in business? The reasons are numerous:

• Vacarro reports that people now wear more casual shoes and sneakers, trading in leather soles for rubber and plastic soled shoes that are thrown away, rather than repaired.
• Customers used to hold onto their shoes for years, repairing heels and soles and having them shined regularly. Now people are more likely to toss shoes than repair them.
• Workplaces have become more casual and people no longer wear good leather shoes everyday.
• Shoemaking is a vanishing trade and it is difficult to find skilled craftsman to repair leather shoes, bags and belts. Vacarro reports that 75% - 80% of shoe repair shops in the country have closed since the 1980’s.
• At one time, the shop repaired shoes for big stores such as Bonwit Teller, Neiman Marcus and Florsheim. But many of those stores have gone out of business and it no longer makes economic sense for stores to repair damaged merchandise.

So what’s in store for Vacarro? He is looking for a new position and for the first time in his life he will work for someone else. He’ll continue to coach and hopes to open a basketball gym with several other local coaches. Looking back at 43 years in town, he reminisced about his friend David Emmer who ran the Scarsdale Wrapping and Shipping Center, and thought of all the stores that closed before him - such as Arcade Stationers, County Men and Boys and the Scarsdale Pharmacy.

He said, “I’ve been very fortunate and learned a lot from my customers. They were patient, beautiful, kind and generous, and very good to my family.” Most would agree that the Vacarros have been good to the people of Scarsdale. They will be missed.