By Allison Perrine | aperrine@tworivertimes.com
RED BANK – This spring, employees of the beloved Hobbymasters shop at 62 White St. will clock out of their shifts for the very last time.
After 45 years of business, the popular hobby center will close permanently as owner Arlene Placer Cosgrove enters into a well-deserved but bittersweet retirement. The exact closing date has not yet been determined, but she believes it will be at the end of March.
Why sell now? “Time,” said the 80-year-old Red Bank resident. “Being tired. Enough is enough.” She signed paperwork Feb. 12 selling the 10,500-square-foot building to Phillip J. Bowers & Co., which owns other properties on White Street and nearby. She doesn’t know what his plans are for the property, but she said she understands the building will be torn down.
Hobbymasters is home to an eclectic array of merchandise, but that wasn’t the original intent for the shop. It was going to be a train store. Cosgrove’s then-husband David Placer had a great interest in steam railroading. To alleviate the stress of his everyday work operating three local gas stations, he wanted to open up a train shop as a hobby.
“This was supposed to be dad’s choo-choo train shop,” said Rob Placer, David and Arlene’s son. “Where my wife went to Disney and other places like that, our summer vacations were spent at Pennsylvania steam railroads.”
But a friend convinced the couple to diversify and diversify they did.
After a remodeling of the building from the inside out, the White Street business soon flooded with the most popular and in-demand must-haves in America.
Cosgrove and David Placer divorced shortly after opening the shop and Cosgrove took on the business with the help of her brother Charles Horowitz. Her three children, Rob, Dawn and Allen also pitched in.
Soon children and adults alike rushed in to pick up the latest trend, whether it was Pokémon cards, Beanie Babies, Transformers, radio-controlled cars, Cabbage Patch Kids, skateboards and snowboards, paintball guns and more.
“We became known as the place to go for these,” said Cosgrove. “They’d be gone as fast as they showed up.” Radio-controlled cars, for example, were so huge in their day that it allowed Hobbymasters to expand the upstairs of the building. And Pokémon gave them enough money to fill the upstairs. At one point, Hobbymasters opened up game nights in the upstairs of the shop and allowed customers to compete in video gaming tournaments.
In addition to the customers who knew of Hobbymasters for its merchandise, others knew about the shop because of its attention-getting storefront. When Cosgrove first took on the building it was solid brown and easily overlooked. It was the site of a former heavy machinery warehouse during World War II and later a bridal shop, a print shop and an arts and crafts store. With the help of the town, painter Burton J. Dodge and designer Roger Baker, they transformed the facade into a lively painted scene of trains, cars, teddy bears, dragons and much more which is still there today.
By 1986, the Placers invited family friends to move into the other part of the building, which later became Toymasters. Together, the two businesses offered the community an even larger array of items. The setup was simple: Toymasters sold toys for children age 6 and up, and Hobbymasters sold other collectibles and items. Toymasters was operated by Paul Zappoli, a friend of Horowitz from Brooklyn, New York. Zappoli later passed away and his wife Denise took over the shop. She gave it a few good years, but eventually she sold the business. Hobbymasters then absorbed the store, said Arlene.
The family has seen many changes over the years in both the Red Bank community and in the hobby and toy industry at large. In Red Bank, for example, the borough was still “very countrified” when they opened in 1975, Cosgrove said. Most of Broad Street was occupied by brokerage firms, aside from a McDonald’s fast-food chain. Some businesses have also stood the test of time, including Garmany, Prown’s Home Improvements and Jack’s Music, which was at that time named Jack’s Records.
And technology has impacted the hobby and toy industries. There are cellphones and internet websites, for starters, to let people know which shops have toys in stock and which don’t. Items can also be purchased online. According to Placer, being open for three years is considered good in their industry, especially for a small business.
But when Hobbymasters first started, it was all about networking. They would establish connections with suppliers and make more in-person trips to stores to find out where the merchandise was. They would buy it, pack their cars and bring it back to Hobbymasters to sell it to the local community.
“We would go in and load up shopping carts, load them to the car and we all brought changes of clothing with us. And it’s not illegal, but we would change clothes and hats and whatnot,” come back in and buy some more, said Placer.
Cosgrove and her son looked back on their years at Hobbymasters with fine memories. The crew is what Cosgrove will miss most, she said. In its prime, Hobbymasters had about 15 to 18 employees working during any given shift. They were able to learn a lot working there about things they might not have learned otherwise, like about model trains.
And what will she do next? Aside from relaxing and enjoying the local community, Cosgrove plans to keep doing what she loves – hunting down tornados. Years ago, she and husband Tom Cosgrove were watching a show on PBS when they came across a meteorologist who explained the guided tours he gives to see such storms.
The couple “plunked the money down” to go on the tours “and that was it. We were hooked,” she said. They have been making these trips every other year for the past decade.
The hobby collection tradition will live on in her son Rob, who operates Family Fun Hobbies in Hamilton. He has been in business for 10 years and counting. Most of the products that are not sold by Hobbymasters’ closing will be brought to Family Fun Hobbies, the mother and son said. And that’s where she advises their customers shop once Hobbymasters closes.
Everyone is welcome to stop in Hobbymasters before its final goodbye. A “retirement celebration” 25 percent off discount is now available for all items in the store. Employees are being paid a bit extra to ride out the last wave with Cosgrove, as she and her family members bid farewell to some amazing memories.
“The goal is to sell as much of it as we can so she’s got money to party with,” Placer joked.
The article originally appeared in the February 20-26, 2020 print edition of The Two River Times.
