{"id":226820,"date":"2026-04-10T21:08:21","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T21:08:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/226820\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T21:08:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T21:08:21","slug":"longstanding-central-florida-hardware-stores-are-closing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/226820\/","title":{"rendered":"Longstanding Central Florida hardware stores are closing"},"content":{"rendered":"

The aisles of Miller\u2019s Hardware in Winter Park<\/a> were packed with customers. Some came looking for deals. But many popped in just to say goodbye to the owner, who\u2019s been a fixture in their lives for decades.<\/p>\n

Miller\u2019s, in business since 1945, is one of two longstanding Central Florida hardware stores that will soon shutter. The store on Fairbanks Avenue began its final liquidation sale Thursday morning.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll miss seeing him. I\u2019m really sad,\u201d said Leslie Lynch, a Miller\u2019s shopper for 30 years. \u201cI don\u2019t know what I\u2019ll buy today, but I just wanted to see it. It\u2019s definitely iconic.\u201d<\/p>\n

After more than 80 years in business, the shop is closing so owner Larry Miller can retire.<\/p>\n

At J & L Hardware in Orlando, which opened in 1971, owners Larry and Belinda Finley are doing the same, closing their shop on Orange Blossom Trail<\/a> so they can stop working.<\/p>\n

Both shops have customers who say they will be sorely missed.<\/p>\n

Slaven Djudaric, a J & L shopper for more than 20 years, said it is the personal touch, which he does not find at big box stores, that has kept him coming back.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ll come in here and ask a question, and there\u2019s always someone to help,\u201d Djudaric said.<\/p>\n

\"BelindaBelinda and Larry Finley, longtime owners of J&L Hardware in Orlando, talk with customer Mario Dias as he pays for an item. The couple are retiring and closing the shop, which has been in operation on Orange Blossom Trail since the 1970s. (Rich Pope\/Orlando Sentinel)<\/p>\n

Both shops have made it their business to supply goods their communities desire.<\/p>\n

For Miller, whose store is a couple blocks from the upscale shopping and dining on Park Avenue, his most popular departments are grills and grilling supplies and lawn and garden. The shop was once nicknamed \u201cThe Woman\u2019s Hardware Store\u201d because of its large housewares department featuring a wide array of kitchen supplies.<\/p>\n

Brightly lit, the store features wide aisles and professional displays that look more like a small department store than the hardware shop it was when Miller\u2019s grandfather opened the business.<\/p>\n

\u201cThings evolve,\u201d Miller said. \u201cYeti didn\u2019t exist back then. Nobody knew what a Big Green Egg was back then,\u201d listing names of companies that make coolers, drinkware and high-end grills. \u201cPVC didn\u2019t exist. We cut galvanized pipe for irrigation systems.\u201d<\/p>\n

The aisles are filled with an eclectic assortment of goods, from gourmet dog food to potato mashers to a collection of paint brushes, some large enough for a house and others small enough for a fine canvas.<\/p>\n

Genevieve Vante has been a Miller\u2019s shopper for more than two decades.\u00a0 When she was making purses out of cigar boxes to sell at craft fairs, she relied on the shop for the parts she needed.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can find everything here that no longer exists in local stores,\u201d Vante said.<\/p>\n

Miller, 70, was born and raised in Winter Park and has worked at his shop since as long as he can remember. His grandfather paid him $1.80 an hour when he was in middle school.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis community has supported generations of my family,\u201d Miller said. \u201cI love this community. I have made so many friends through this business.\u201d<\/p>\n

The plan was for Miller\u2019s son, Clay Miller, to take over the business, but he died in 2019, and none of Miller\u2019s other children want to run it. So Miller\u2019s will close, though Miller has not yet settled on a date.<\/p>\n

J & L, located in an industrial area surrounded by blue-collar businesses, is a quarter the size of Miller\u2019s and shows its age. Its wooden display shelves were hand-built by the Finleys when they took over the business in the mid-1990s. Its walls are lined with aging pegboards.<\/p>\n

The shop carries specialized plumbing parts and has dozens of cases that look like card catalogs and are filled with hard-to-find screws and bolts.<\/p>\n

Most of Finley\u2019s employees have handyman businesses on the side. Finley values them as much for their hard work as he does for the knowledge they bring to the shop.<\/p>\n

Tyrone Hill has worked at the shop for 25 years. He also runs his own plumbing business and said about half his clients came from J & L.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomething my dad used to say when I was growing up, \u2018Son, always remember there\u2019s a time when all good things must come to an end\u2019,\u201d Hill said. \u201cThis has been a good thing for the Finleys. This has been a pleasant experience for me. But I have a lot of mixed emotions because the community is going to miss the store.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BobBob Schmidt helps a customer at J&L Hardware in Orlando on Thursday, April 8, 2027. Owners Larry and Belinda Finley are retiring and closing their shop, which has been in operation on Orange Blossom Trail since the 1970s. (Rich Pope\/Orlando Sentinel)<\/p>\n

J & L is a spot where contractors go for a second opinion and a rare part, and residents in the surrounding neighborhoods come for guidance on home repairs.<\/p>\n

Larry Finley was a civil engineer and his wife a dental assistant when they abandoned those careers in 1995 and purchased J & L from Belinda Finley\u2019s parents, who started the store.<\/p>\n

Since then, Larry Finley has been at the shop six days a week, weathering the businesses highs and lows. When internet shopping gained in popularity, their business took a hit. But things were booming in the early 2000s, as the housing market was thriving.<\/p>\n

The shop never recovered from the business it lost during the COVID-19 pandemic, however.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was looking the other day, we used to average about 125 a day and now it\u2019s 65 or 70,\u201d Larry Finley said.<\/p>\n

The Finleys, who are in their 70s, plan on spending more time with their grandchildren, and traveling, something they haven\u2019t been able to do with the demands of running the shop.<\/p>\n

They will be closing at the end of May and, in June, they are taking a long overdue vacation to Alaska.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a bittersweet situation,\u201d Larry Finley said. \u201cI\u2019ll miss going into work every day. But I look forward to time with family.\u201d<\/p>\n

At Miller\u2019s, where recently hung signs announce, \u201cStore Closing\u201d and \u201cOur Biggest Sale Ever\u201d, the store\u2019s current owner isn\u2019t yet sure what he\u2019ll do in his retirement.<\/p>\n

\u201cI worked hard all my life,\u201d Miller said. \u201cNow I\u2019m going to play harder.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The aisles of Miller\u2019s Hardware in Winter Park were packed with customers. Some came looking for deals. But…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":226821,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[558,114,266,139,141,140,109,76686],"class_list":["post-226820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-business","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-social","tag-social-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=226820"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226820\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/226821"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=226820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=226820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=226820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}