By sandi carpello
Staff Writer
CHRIS KELLY The owner of JJ’s General Store, Irwin Katz, hopes to fill the void left by The Bon Ton and Prown’s for general merchandise. The store opened this week on Shrewsbury Avenue in Red Bank.
RED BANK — In the era of big-box stores, Irwin Katz thinks there is still a place for the little guy. The trick is finding that place, and Katz thinks he has done just that with JJ’s General Store, which just opened at 123 Shrewsbury Ave.
"The west side is resurging, there’s no two ways about it," said Katz, a Bronx, N.Y.-born business owner who has worked as an area salesman for the past 30 years.
"With Prown’s and the Bon Ton out of business, there is a void in town for general merchandise … it seems like most of the stores are located on the east side and there isn’t much on the west side. The Westsiders are the people who make the town work."
With that said, Katz opened JJ’s General Store last Friday. The store may not "have everything," but it is a place where you can find an abundance of items, from fly swatters to fashionable toilet seat lids.
CHRIS KELLY From shower curtains to alarm clocks to T-shirts, JJ’s offers general merchandise at low prices.
Located in a 1,000-square-foot building — which formerly housed an antiques shop and an old-fashioned pharmacy — JJ’s offers a large array of household and hardware items, footwear and clothing.
Still a bit of a work in progress, $5.99 fashion pocketbooks hang directly behind the cash register, $14.99 blue jeans are piled in cubby holes, and $19.99 Belgium imported area rugs hang proudly on the wall. JJ’s also offers sneakers, T-shirts, mops, tools, shower curtains, blenders and tablecloths.
"I’ve done my homework," said Katz, who buys all the items at wholesale prices from Manhattan and Brooklyn merchants. "I’ve gone into areas similar to the west side and saw what I needed to look for."
While he has a general knowledge of what the market wants, Katz knows the customers themselves will be the best source of information about what he has on his shelves. Already he has taken some special requests.
"Customers have asked me for things like hair products, alarm clocks, and knee socks, and I’m going to get it for them."
Mauro Velazquez, a west side resident who bought a shower curtain and liner last Monday morning, said he liked the store because it was within walking distance from his Shrewsbury Avenue home.
"I don’t have a car," he said. "There aren’t really any other places around here to get things you need."
JJ’s General Store, located on the corner of Shrewsbury Avenue and Chestnut Street, will be open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Sundays from noon to 5 p.m.