Some businesses stay in the same place. Solomon’s Furniture isn’t one of them

By John Townes PITTSFIELD

— Solomon’s Furniture has moved around a lot.

The local furniture story recently moved to another new location, this one in a brick former industrial building on 2 Brown St. in Pittsfield, that had housed the former Pittsfield Furniture for 20 years. Solomon’s moved there in early January after Pittsfield Furniture closed following 34 years in business.

Since Adams native and owner James Solomon started the business in 2008, Solomon’s Furniture has been located in three other spaces: on Merrill Road in Pittsfield; at the Berkshire Mall in Lanesborough and at the Lee Premium Outlets shopping complex in Lee. Starting in 2011, Solomon operated the stores on Merrill Road and the Berkshire Mall at the same time, before closing the Merrill Road store, and later consolidating everything in Lee.

The store was originally located on Merrill Road when Solomon started the business in 2008 in the space formerly occupied by Bear’s Furniture and Mattress. Solomon, who had been sales manager at Bear’s, started his own business at that site when the owner of Bear’s retired.

Solomon is leasing the property on Brown Street from former Pittsfield Furniture owner Paul Clark, and has an option to buy.

“I had wanted to locate the store in Pittsfield, and this opportunity came up when Paul decided to retire and close Pittsfield Furniture,” said Solomon. Pittsfield Furniture was originally located in the former Pittsfield Plaza shopping center on West Housatonic Street before Clark moved it to Brown Street some 20 years ago.

The store’s transition back to Pittsfield was very noticeable to motorists and pedestrians for many weeks who may have thought they were seeing double. Both the closing of Pittsfield Furniture, and the subsequent re-opening of Solomon’s, were publicized by people standing at various locations around the city holding signs that announced the changes. The signs for the opening of one store and the closing of the other were nearly identical, as they were the same size, contained the same lettering, and were often held by people that were stationed in the same places.

Both businesses had separately used that marketing strategy in the past, Solomon said.

Solomon grew up in Adams and still lives in that town. He entered the furniture business in 1996 as an employee of Bear’s Furniture and Mattress before becoming sales manager. In 2008, when the owner of the local Bear’s retired and closed the business, Solomon started his own furniture and bedding store there.

In 2011, he opened his second store in the Berkshire Mall.

“The mall was a much larger space, and it generated a majority of our business,” he said. “So I decided to focus on that.”

While Solomon’s was successful there, the Berkshire Mall was in its difficult final years, and experienced a steady exodus of merchants and declines in customer traffic. Solomon’s had been located next to Sears, one of the mall’s anchor tenants. When Sears left the mall in 2018, Solomon closed his store.

But Solomon had also operated a second business in the Berkshire Mall, DJ’s Gifts, a seasonal pop-up store for about three years. He originally moved DJ’s to the outlet mall in Lee as a full-time store, before deciding to open another Solomon’s Furniture there in 2021.

The store in the outlet mall did well, but it was smaller and served a different market. The majority of that shopping center’s tenants are outlet stores that belong to national retail chains.

“While it did draw residents and second-home owners from Lee and other nearby communities, it primarily at- tracted tourists visiting the outlet mall, who generally bought smaller items they could fit in their vehicles,” Solomon said.

When the Pittsfield site became available, he decided to move the business back to the county’s largest municipality.

“After I closed the Berkshire Mall store, I looked for a place in Pittsfield but noting suitable was available at the time,” he said. “When the site of Pittsfield Furniture became available, it was a good fit for my original goals for the business. In addition to being in Pittsfield, it was significantly larger.”

Another advantage to being in Pittsfield is that the store is also now more accessible to customers who lived in other areas of the Berkshires, Solomon said.

On Brown Street, Solomon and Clark agreed that Solomon could initially lease the site with an option to buy the property, which is located in a mixeduse neighborhood just east of Silver Lake and the William Stanley Business Park of the Berkshires. The space includes a 20,000 square-foot showroom and sales area along with a 15,000 square-foot warehouse.

“My goal is to grow the business from here and eventually buy the property,” he said

Like other businesses, Solomon’s has had to contend with the impact of the COVID pandemic and overall economic disruptions, including inflation and supply shortages. But Solomon said those conditions are improving.

“A year ago it was very difficult getting inventory because of shortages at the manufacturers,” he said.

“If we placed an order, delivery could be months out. But over the last six months it has become the opposite situation. There is a lot of inventory, and now when I place an order I can usually have it delivered within two weeks.”

Solomon’s (solomonsfurnitureandmore.com) has a staff of six people.

Solomon said the furniture and bedding store serves a range of markets, from promotional (lower cost) to midend products. It offers brands such as Ashley Furniture, Best Chair and England’s, among others. Prices for sofas, for example, range from about $499 to $3,500.

Mattresses are a significant portion of the business, he added. Those range from $149 to about $5,000. Solomon’s was