Business Profile: Niles Flooring Center, Peekskill
Niles Flooring Center, located in the Beach Shopping Center in Peekskill, has been family-owned for 55 years. Since taking ownership in 1987, Anthony Viverito, along with his brother Pat, has looked to continue the service Viverito believes is unique to family-owned businesses.
Viverito credits the start of his career to his father, also named Pat. “Originally we had learned it from our father who had started out floor covering at the age of nine years old,” he said.
Viverito explained that later in his father’s life, he owned a store in which he and his brother helped out. Anthony helped with the selling and Pat helped with the installment.
However, flooring and windows is not the plan Viverito had laid out for himself. He attended Iona College to get a degree in business management. “I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do but back in those days everyone was taking business management,” he recalled. “I really didn’t want to be in floor covering I was looking for something more glamorous.”
After college, Viverito decided to take on hotel management. However, he was met with little success. So, he and his brother decided to turn to what they knew best.
“We had no interest in flooring but we ended up back in it anyway,” he said.
The brothers started out right at home. “We started selling flooring out of our father’s basement.” The brothers would go into people homes while selling flooring out of the house. Since they were doing so well they decided to look into opening their own store.
According to Viverito, Niles was only a flooring center before the he and his brother took over. “We added the windows, blinds, wood floors, and laminate floors, as the flooring trends changed,” he said.
Owning a store was new to the brothers but as Viverito explained, “We learned as we grew.”
The store, which was owned by “Lou” as he recalls, had been family owned since 1957. Viverito believes there is something to be said about family-owned businesses and strives to keep that going at his store. He feels the “mom and pop” brand of business provides something the bigger businesses don’t provide. He also feels that bigger businesses are a hindrance to family owned business.
“The mom and pop businesses are being squashed by big stores with there big marketing dollars. It’s not like they’re any cheaper.” he said.
Viverito feels he adds a more personal touch to the service his customers get.
“My customers walk into the store and their just like family,” he said. “They come back to me time and time again.”
Viverito doesn’t see the business continuing with his children. His son is studying sports management at Towson University and his daughter is studying dance while going to Yorktown High School. However, he wants to continue the family-owned brand.
Viverito lives in Yorktown Heights with his wife Mary, his son AJ, and his daughter Danielle.
This Friday, from 6 to 10 p.m., Niles Flooring will be holding an open house event with presentations from experts. To contact Niles Flooring and Windows, call (914) 737-6780.
By Robert Christie
Adam has worked in the local news industry for the past two decades in Westchester County and the broader Hudson Valley. Read more from Adam’s author bio here.
