Published March 11, 2021
By MAUREEN DOHERTY
NORTH READING — It’s a day everyone hoped would never arrive. Fifty-eight years after their late parents, Ed and Gloria Carr, established Carr’s Stationer’s, the Carr sisters will be closing the doors to their store later this spring.
MaryEllen and Karen are lifelong North Reading residents beloved by generations of townies. Having grown up in the store, their parents taught them the importance of treating every customer like a member of their family. And they take a special kind of pride in carrying on this tradition that is rarely found in retail environments today. You might say it’s a calling. They work in their store seven days a week.
“It’s not a business, it’s a life and it’s not a store, it’s a home!” MaryEllen believes.
Karen concurs. “I’m going to miss the customers. You become part of their lives. You see them during the happy times and the sad times. We’ve had a lot of people come in here and when they found out we were closing they were crying. It’s not so much the money you make, it’s the relationships you build with people,” she said.
When customers tell her that their husband or father has died, for instance, Karen says they know she and her sister truly empathize with them.
“There was a woman who came in looking for a bookmark and she was visibly distressed. We had what she was looking for; her daughter had just tried to commit suicide, and I told her I’d pray for her and that I’d pray for her daughter, and that I cared. A few months later the daughter I had prayed for came in, crying, telling me it meant so much to her that someone cared about her. That’s the things that I remember, because when you deal with people you have a chance to make a difference. In a soulless world, it’s something,” Karen believes.
The Carr sisters know the details of every product they sell and they understand the preferences of their customers often better than the shoppers themselves. Shopping at Carr’s Hallmark is like having a personal shopper cater to your every need. Looking for a card to commemorate a special occasion months after traditional events such as confirmations or graduations are typically held? The Carr girls are sure to have a card tucked away to save the day. Need a special gift to celebrate the birth of a baby or the wedding of a grandchild? The girls are more than happy to help you find it and even gift-wrap it. Looking for a bracelet, a unique pocketbook or scarf, hand lotion or candles, religious items, whimsical plaques, wine glasses, Christmas ornaments in July? It’s all here.
Their father, who was awarded seven Bronze stars for his heroism during the second world war “never wanted to be unemployed,” MaryEllen recalled. Prior to being drafted, he had worked in Boston near the State House for Henry Rosnosky Printer and Stationer and while he was away during the war his old boss held his job and would send him care packages from the A&P grocery store.
After the war, he returned to work for Rosnosky. After Ed and Gloria married and moved to North Reading, where they built their house on Park Street, MaryEllen said her father bought a small piece of land not far from NRHS for their future store. “For seven years on weekends, he built his store brick by brick,” MaryEllen said. They opened the store on Feb. 9, 1963, before Karen was born.
For years it was a true stationers with all the traditional items and office supplies one would need long before mega-giants like Staples were created.
In the early 1970s, Carr’s Stationers moved to the Grants’ Plaza on Main Street, the current location of Walmart Plaza at 72 Main St. In the late 1970s, when that retail plaza was transformed into a facility for Nixdorf computers, their parents moved the store for the third and final time, to the former Atlantic Plaza at 265 Main St., leasing from the Rubin family. They have been here for 42 years.
They have seen the anchor tenant change from Atlantic to Star Market to Shaw’s and now Stop & Shop. They have seen countless other businesses come and go. Remember McWongs? Hit or Miss? Pizza Hut? Brooks Drug? Sunrise Bagels? Carr’s out-lasted all of them.
Their mom, Gloria, was always a fixture at the store as well, striking up conversations with everyone who visited. She could add any figure in her head and was well known for her generosity and her strong Catholic faith. She kept a prayer journal by her side at all times and would write down the name of any loved one upon request to pray for them daily in their time of need. Often, while checking out items at the cash register, the store phone would ring and Gloria would pull out her overstuffed notebook to write down the first name of another person added to the prayer list.
“It’s been a great 58 years! The times that stick out to me aren’t the times we were selling Beanie babies or Elf on a Shelf, but times I saw a little boy who was so excited to be buying his mom a birthday card and he didn’t have nearly enough money and my dad counted it and said, ‘just right!’” MaryEllen said in a recent Facebook post. “Or my mom telling someone who didn’t have money for food to ‘come shake my hand’ and she had a $20 bill folded up in her palm so the person wouldn’t be embarrassed in front of others. Or my mom sending stickers and markers and drawing pads to sick kids in the hospital.”
Their parents were married for nearly 45 years prior to their dad’s passing in 1999. Their mom passed 15 years later in 2014.
After surviving nearly three months of forced closure by the state of emergency declared by Gov. Baker one year ago this week, they happily re-opened to the public prior to Father’s Day and have been open ever since. Anticipating better days ahead as vaccinations have shown promise and will be available to the general public by late spring or early summer, Karen and MaryEllen purchased a full stock of all the winter, spring and early summer holidays and events. But a few days after Valentine’s Day their latest landlord informed them that their unit and the unit beside them formerly occupied by a karate studio would be combined for a national chain pet supply store.
Due to clauses in their lease, they can be forced out early if a higher paying tenant wants the space, and other clauses held by the anchor tenant regulate the distance between competitors who sell similar products. The former drug store space has been vacant for years, for instance. But for the Carr’s to move their store to another unit, their franchise agreement with Hallmark would require updates that would be prohibitively expensive due to the cost of fixtures, from lighting to shelving and display units to rugs and merchandise. During a time when brick and mortar stores are shuttering at a record pace nationwide, it does not appear to be a wise investment for them.
They have new inventory ready to sell for all the spring holidays through June — Easter, Passover, First Communion, Confirmation, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, graduation, birthdays, sympathy cards and weddings.
In addition to Hallmark products like gift wrap, bows and cards, customers will find collections such as Willow Tree, wine glasses, frames, baby gifts, stationery, toys such as Melissa and Doug and Klutz educational books, Inis cologne, Naked Bee products, jewelry, boxed wooden signs, Snoozie slippers Chowdaheadz gifts, Ty stuffed animals and Myra upcycled bags.
“I never saw it coming in Covid. I never would expect them to do this during a pandemic; to get rid of somebody that couldn’t sell their goods last year for being closed,” Karen said.
The sisters do hope old friends and new stop by before the end of April to say goodbye so they can say thank you. “I love talking to people,” MaryEllen said. “I’ll miss talking to people most.”
