Andrew "Buddy" Scallia, 73-year-old owner of Buddy's Shoe Repair, said he felt the years of stress melt away when he learned his son was coming home to take over the family business.
As he bustled around the Hixson store recently, Mr. Scallia said that with the additions of his son, Michael, and grandson, Aaron Yarbrough, to the roster, the family business will enter a fourth generation of service in this industry.
"I have been working in here for 64 years, and we were gonna slow down, get ready to get out," said Mr. Scallia, whose grandfather James Dee founded the business of making shoes and then repairing them in 1906 in Sandusky, Ohio. In 1917 the family moved the shop to Chattanooga at Mitchell and Main.
Some Chattanooga shoe repair shops* Buddy's Shoe Repair5221 Hixson Pike870-8911* Hakky Shoe RepairUpper level of Hamilton Place mall892-6167* Kenton's Shoe Shop802 Broad St.756-3726* Shoe Findz and repair6210 Ringgold Road894-4402Source: J.H. Cook and Sons Inc., a shoe supplies distributor
"We were just overworked beyond measure, and my son Michael came in and said 'Dad, Mom, I see the stress and the toll this is taking on you, and I decided I wanted to come in there and give you some help.'"
Mr. Scallia's grandfather founded the store after the family had immigrated through Ellis Island from Italy, and he built his success on the pillars of quality materials, quality workmanship and customer relationships, Mr. Scallia said. The cobbler maintained his grandfather's success by sustaining these traditions with what he calls his "business family."
"Treat the customer as if they are your most important asset and give 'em the best service you can, because they deserve that," Mr. Scallia said. "Don't look at them as a dollar sign, because you can lose the customer over a dollar, but if you win the customer, you can't lose the dollar."
The elder Mr. Scallia said that if he is well known, it is in part because of a distinctive message board outside the shop that he changes daily. He said he puts a serious, biblical message on one side of the sign and a humorous message on the other side.
"My faith is not only a big part of my business, it's the only part, because I can't operate any other way. We're just here serving, my whole life's ministry is just serving," said Mr. Scallia. "Probably the message that most people remember is, 'This Italian cobbler has a peach of a wife.'" His wife, Barbara, has been behind the counter for 35 years.
Son Michael, who will take over the family business in a few years, shares Mr. Scallia's customer-centered philosophy.
"The customers are the reason we're here, they're the reason we all have our bills paid, and if you don't satisfy them, then they're not gonna be here and you're not gonna be here after too long, so you've got to keep them on the top priority," said Mr. Scallia.
The younger Scallia hopes his presence will give some relief to his parents, who work long hours in the store to keep up with skyrocketing demand.
"I've been around it all my life; I didn't go to day care as a toddler because I was in the window of the shoe shop," said Michael Scallia, who quit his job at an auto body shop to become a cobbler. "It was a pretty easy transition moving in here, and I knew a lot of the work just from seeing them do it in the past."
Good cobblers are a scarce commodity these days, with the total number of cobblers in the U.S. falling from tens of thousands in the mid-20th century to fewer than 7,000 today, according to Donald Rinaldi, president of the Shoe Service Institute of America.
"Back in the '40s and '50s, there were sixty- to seventy-thousand shoe repairers across the country serviced by hundreds of wholesalers," Mr. Rinaldi said.
Shoe repairers are adapting to changing economic conditions by moving into the orthopedic shoe customization, which is a growing side of the business, according to Mr. Rinaldi. He said the fact that recession-stricken consumers often seek shoe repair instead of buying new ones is a bright spot in a shrinking industry.
"People look at a pair of shoes, and rather than go out and buy a new pair, they'll get the pair fixed and save some money," Mr. Rinaldi said.