Relocation to Boardman pays off for Mr. Darby’s

By JORDYN GRZELEWSKI

jgrzelewski@vindy.com

BOARDMAN

Just a few weeks after moving to a location in the township, the owner of Mr. Darby’s Antique Mall is astounded by the positive response from customers.

“Our sales were up 62 percent from before we even opened,” said Robert Neapolitan, who opened the business about five years ago in North Lima. He recently moved to an upgraded site at 8574 Market St., next to Antone’s Banquet Centre.

He attributes that success so far to “location, location, location.”

Though Mr. Darby’s is new to Boardman, Neapolitan and his family are not. He, his father and grandfather all previously owned businesses in the township, and Neapolitan, a Boardman High School graduate, lives here. His mother, Alma; wife, Karen, and two children help run the business as well.

Neapolitan decided to open the original store after he noticed an unoccupied building in a plaza and thought it would make a good location for a business.

“I was always into collecting and always into selling – mainly online. But I saw that market was really starting to take a dive because of costs and expenses, and also because of negative feedback from people who were trying to take advantage of you,” he said. “With an antique mall, the person sees the product and can evaluate it in person.”

Mr. Darby’s specializes in antiques and collectibles that are supplied by roughly 100 vendors who rent space in the store. Merchandise rotates in and out of the store every five days or so.

“What’s unique is, we only have one of every item, so if a customer procrastinates and doesn’t pick it up, it might not be here the next day,” Neapolitan said.

Those items include vinyl records, comic books, antique toys, vintage clothing, furniture, home goods, jewelry, typewriters, vintage signs and much more.

The most-unique item in the store “changes every day,” Neapolitan said. One that readily came to mind, however, was a collection of 60 hatchets.

“I sold them the next day,” he said.

Other popular items, he said, are ones with vintage local logos. Anything tied to Idora Park, for example, flies off the shelves.

Some of the merchandise is supplied by the Neapolitans themselves – for example, for sale right now is the crib that Alma slept in as a baby.

An ironing board gifted to Alma by Neapolitan’s father after the couple got married in the 1950s recently was purchased by a set designer for an upcoming Denzel Washington movie titled “Fences,” which begins filming this month.

The designer also purchased a couch, toys and other items that will appear in the film set in the 1950s.

Neapolitan gets a kick out of the fact he’ll see his merchandise in a major motion picture, especially the family ironing board.

“It still had the original McKelvey’s tags on it,” he said. “Someday I might watch that movie and see that darn ironing board. ... It’ll remind me of [my mom}.”

At age 85, Alma reports to Mr. Darby’s every day to manage the finances. She said she enjoys interacting with customers.

“We get a lot of seniors in here, and it’s a place for them to socialize,” she said. “They come in here and reminisce about all these items they see that they used to have. ... It’s beautiful.”