It wasn't all that long ago when if you wanted to buy a card and perhaps a small present to go with it, you would visit one of the many local Mom and Pop gift shops. Lorain had a lot of these small stores over the years. They were usually affiliated with a major brand of greeting cards such as Hallmark, and carried a wide variety of unique merchandise. I'm sure you had your favorite (such as Margie's Hallmark at the Lorain Plaza).
Sadly, there doesn't seem to be many of these stores anymore. People just don't send as many cards as they used to, preferring instead to offer greetings online.
But sixty years ago, these small gift shops were very popular and a new one opening in Downtown Lorain was big news. Above you see the Grand Opening full-page ad for one of them: Sugar 'N Spice, at 524 Broadway. It ran in the Lorain Journal back on September 2, 1964.
It's a nice-looking ad (although the stencil typeface for the store name gives it a cargo crate feeling). According to the ad, the store carried Barton Candies – something different from the usual Whitman's, etc. Many of the Barton selections came in uniquely designed tins.
Sugar 'N Spice was successful enough to stay open right into the 1970s. Here's one of those business page articles from the October 26, 1970 Journal. It includes a photo of Marjorie Shame, a clerk at the store.
And here's another article, from the December 21, 1970 edition.
On July 10, 1976 a tornado struck Lorain and parts of Lorain as far south as Oberlin. Sugar 'N Spice is one of the stores that was mentioned in the article (from the
Journal the same day) below as suffering damage. (Note how the photo of pretty flag-draped
Colleen Conley of Wellington is conveniently in the middle of the article!)
I'm not sure if the storm had anything to do with it, but by late 1976, Sugar 'N Spice was closing down. Here's a classified ad from January 3, 1977 announcing the sale of the cash register, mimeograph (remember those?), and other office items.
It's kind of sad to see these stores, as well as the independent pharmacies that often had their own card/gift sections, go away.
Although I passed by this shop hundreds of times on my way home from high school or traveling south many blocks to my grandfather’s tavern, I don’t think we ever went in to shop. I’d have rather bought some peanut brittle from the downtown Faron’s store - ohh that store smelled so good! In the early sixties, my mom bought her greeting cards from a little shop in the Sheffield Lake Shoreway Plaza. If I behaved, she’d buy me a tiny glass figurine - I still have a little squirrel with two broken paws somewhere…I sure miss those little independent gift shops and country stores. Now we just click online and wait for the delivery…
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