Will miss the neighborhood hardware store

It was with a touch of sadness that I read in the May 31 issue of the Thousand Oaks Acorn the ad announcing the closure of Newbury Park Hardware Inc.

I shopped there knowing that an employee would always be readily available to direct me to a product I was looking for or to answer my questions. Its demise is yet another example of the difficulty for small business retailers to compete with the big-box stores, and it drains the community of some if its character. Lou Pupich Newbury Park