Huntington Thrift to close next month

Huntington Thrift, a Huntington Station retailer that opened in 2023, has announced it will close Sept. 20.

In an Instagram post, owner Michael Esteves, wrote, "After many wonderful years, Huntington Thrift is closing its doors. We want to thank all of our amazing customers for your support, friendships, and memories throughout the years. We appreciate all the support from literally everyone. We've decided to go into a different direction. We had a fun journey with everyone. Stay tuned for the next month of deals on deals on deals."

Esteves, who also owns and operates American Tag Sales in Plainview, told Newsday shortly after opening in December 2023 that "secondhand items can also be transformed and their stories continue to be told. New or old, used or unused, every one of our items has a story to tell, and the store helps make sure that they continue to be told." He said at the time that he viewed the shop as his "chance to make an impact and have clients who love saving items from landfills as much as I do."

The store, at 2087 New York Ave., has sold antiques, vintage clothing, housewares, tools and collectibles, most of which Esteves found at estate sales and auctions. In his post, Esteves said the store is having a going out of business sale.

In his "everything must go" posting, Esteves added, "Thank you for being part of our journey. We truly appreciate every customer who has walked through our doors."

Esteves — who also founded a vintage store in Bushwick, Brooklyn, before the pandemic — said in a phone interview that he's closing the store to focus on his other businesses, including Plainview-based All-American Tag Sale, an estate liquidation firm. "Plus, the landlord raised the rent on us. We wanted to keep going but unfortunately, the Long Island rent market for commercial is unaffordable for small businesses. We looked into moving elsewhere but all the bigger facilities were three times the price on square footage, which makes it almost impossible to survive. That's what it comes down to. We looked for about six months, and had a real estate agent and couldn't find anything suitable that fit our needs — for example, we need a basement for more inventory variety."

He added that "the thrift industry is awesome — -we love recycling [and] people have the opportunity to buy something amazing for a great price. But with labor costs and rent, it doesn't work [for us.]."

Esteves said everything in the store will be priced for a dollar "leading two weeks up to the closing. We don't want anything to end up in the landfill and we want to recycle as much as we can and do good by our customers, who did great by us the last three years."

Nationally, the thrift business has been growing. According to a July trends report by Jacob Posada, an analyst with New York-based IBISWorld, a market research company, "the Thrift Stores industry in the U.S. is expanding modestly but benefiting from powerful structural tail winds."

Posada wrote that "revenue will reach an estimated $13.7 billion in 2026, growing 2.0% this year as tariff-driven inflation on new apparel pushes consumers toward secondhand options." The sale of secondhand clothing has expanded most dramatically, he wrote, attributing that to data from ThredUp, the online consignment store, which claims "59% of consumers" buy secondhand.