After 80 years in Forest Park, Chicago Suburban Lumber Sales on Franklin Street, next to the CTA Green Line and Metra railyard, is closing up shop, and the property is on the market.
The decision to shutter the family-owned business comes as large corporations take over the lumber and building materials business.
“The entire industry is being bought out by these venture capitalist groups. The old ma and pa lumber stores are gone. They’re all owned by these big investment groups,” said Mark Romano, one of 13 children of Joe Romano Sr., who started Chicago Suburban Lumber in 1946.
Mark said in the 1970s, there were a dozen independent lumber wholesalers in the Chicagoland area. The industrially zoned, half-acre lot of Chicago Suburban Lumber was the last one operating.
Chicago Suburban Lumber was set to close this summer, when Mark’s brother, Tim Romano, who managed the business, planned to retire. But the property was put on the market sooner than expected after Tim died from cancer in February.
Mark said what he’ll miss most about the family business is the memories he has of working alongside his brothers, dad and aunt, starting in high school, when he’d load lumber onto rail cars by hand.
“It’s the emotional connection of having a family business and the memories of it — they were wonderful years,” Mark Romano said. “It’s sad to see it go, but life moves on. You have to accept that life changes.”
History of Chicago Suburban Lumber
Long before Chicago Suburban Lumber opened in 1946, 7459 Franklin St. was part of Barr & Collins. From the early 1900s, Barr & Collins sold coal and lumber, loading materials directly onto rail cars.
Joe Romano Sr. worked for Motorola during World War II and, when the war ended, had $350 to his name, his son said. With that money, Romano Sr. bought a vehicle and joined the trucking business, delivering loads of lumber from train cars in Forest Park. Living frugally and saving money, he bought a house in River Forest with cash, then bought part of Barr & Collins’ property and built three warehouses on it.
Still a River Forest resident, Mark Romano said his dad was one of the first people in the lumber industry to use a forklift — technology that was being developed around the time he bought land for Chicago Suburban Lumber.
“He was the first lumber wholesaler to become mechanized with a forklift,” Romano said of his dad. “That gave him a tremendous competitive advantage because the infrastructure of the old lumber yards didn’t allow for forklifts. Everything was handloaded.”
But that wasn’t the only think Romano Sr. was known for. He specialized in selling redwood — millions of feet worth in his heyday — at a time when treated lumber didn’t exist.
“He had a tremendous reputation in the whole industry. He was known nationally as ‘The Redwood King,’” Romano said.
By the time the U.S. and Canadian redwood supply had diminished in the 1980s, Romano Sr. had started selling cedar and industrial lumber.
Following President Ronald Regan’s administration, Romano said the family business saw more box stores emerge, like Lowe’s and Home Depot. That’s when he remembers first seeing a wave of independent building material businesses shuttering, and again with the 2008 recession.
Now, it’s Chicago Suburban Lumber’s turn to close up shop.
Romano Sr. worked there until 2015, when he was 93. He stopped working a few months before he died, according to his son. His sister, who was a year older than him, did accounting for the company from the day it opened until her brother retired.
Romano said his dad was most proud of how successful he made his business on his own, never borrowing finances to start up shop.
“He was an incredible money manager. He had an instinct for it. His investments were always spot on. He balanced his portfolios very well,” Romano said.
Before retiring, Romano Sr. worked 60 hours a week while his wife stayed home and cared for their 13 kids.
“The interesting story was his ability to build that business with that depression-era mentality,” Romano said of his dad. “He lived a very simple life and was very generous to a lot of people. He was a person of incredible integrity and honesty.”
While Mark Romano hasn’t worked at Chicago Suburban Lumber since the 1990s, he still deals in building materials. For the last 30 years, he’s run a sales rep and consulting business with his own sons, where they bring new building products to market.
Romano said his background in the building materials industry and his nationwide network of peers has helped build his company’s success. He added that his father was also proud of the friendships he formed in their family business.
“In those years, the lumber industry was very dynamic with a lot of different personalities,” Romano said. “It wasn’t the harsh, corporate environment that it’s now become.”