“If you told me when I was 15 that I was going to sit next to my brother every day and work, I would have said you were out of your mind,” says Kristy Peterkin. “But it’s worked beautifully.”
There’s actually not a lot of sitting involved. Running Ayers Variety & Hardware, a Westover staple for 78 years, has kept the siblings on their toes ever since they took over day-to-day operations from their parents, Wilma and Ronald Kaplan, in 2020. That’s partly why Peterkin and her brother, Keith Kaplan, announced on July 5 that they were closing up shop.
“We’re not leaving because things are bad,” Peterkin says. “We’re not leaving because the landlord was a problem. We’re not leaving because we weren’t profitable. We’re leaving because we’re ready, and our children don’t want to take it over.”
In an effort to empty the shelves, remaining inventory at the time of this reporting was going for 40% off. “My guesstimate now is that we’ll be open till around the 20th [of July], but I’ll announce it as soon as I know,” she says. “Then we have a liquidator who will come in and try to auction off what’s left. Whatever is left after that, either they’ll haul away or we will have to donate.”
Closing Time
The decision to close wasn’t easy. With the lease coming up for negotiation before it ends on July 31, Peterkin says she and Kaplan decided two years ago that they wouldn’t renew it. They discussed it with their father and received his blessing before died in November 2025. (Their mother died in 2024.)
“It was much easier knowing that he knew,” Peterkin says. “I would have probably felt a lot of guilt or felt like I was letting him down if it had been after the fact. He was excited for us because he knew we had the next phase.”
A lifelong small business owner, Ronald Kaplan at one point owned the Clinton 5 & 10 in Clinton, Maryland. Once department stores such as Woolworth’s and Kmart came to town, he knew his store wouldn’t survive. He started looking for a hardware store in the D.C. area, assuming the sector was less vulnerable to competition from big-box retailers. That’s when he happened upon the Westover business John Ayers had founded in 1948.
“Ayers was appealing because there wasn’t any of that around it,” Peterkin says. “But [Ayers’] price was too high. My father couldn’t afford it.”
When Ayers died in 1976, he left the store to a nephew who didn’t want it. The nephew contacted Kaplan with a new price (Peterkin says she doesn’t know how much that was) and the store changed hands in 1977.
The Case for Continuity
Ronald Kaplan didn’t change much at Ayers. The store had a good reputation and knowledgable employees who were willing to stay. He held fast to its beloved mom-and-pop traditions, stationing a Santa in the store in December and giving out candy at Halloween and Easter.
“The only thing he changed in the first couple of years was the shelving,” Peterkin says. “The old shelving was square counters, and unfortunately, they were a shoplifter’s paradise. My dad rearranged the store into aisles—the same aisles that they are now.”
Peterkin was about 11 years old when her parents assumed ownership, but her most vivid memories of the time don’t involve the store. “The only real memories I have of it are the car ride home because we got to stop at Weenie Beenie and share a hamburger,” she says of the fabled hot dog and half-smoke joint that’s been in Arlington since 1954.
Her brother Keith started working at the store right out of college, in 1988. “I think my dad had asked him at some point to come work for a little bit,” she says. “He did and he never left.”
Peterkin lived in Chicago for a few years, working at Deloitte and Touche. When Ayers’ manager left in 1998, her father asked her to step in for a year. Twenty-eight years later, she is finally leaving.
A Family Business
For a time, all four members of the Kaplan family ran the store. Wilma and Ronald cut back in 2019 and stopped altogether when the covid-19 pandemic hit in 2020.
“My parents were still covering the weekends,” Peterkin says. “They were in their early and late 80s. I was petrified they were going to get sick, so they stayed home. And really, from that point on, it’s only been Keith and me.”
She took over the bookkeeping from her father, while Keith handled all things schedule- and hardware-related. A typical work week was 50-55 hours, but it jumped to 60-70 during “plant season” from April to June.
“I have to do the job that I regularly do, plus take care of all the plants—ordering, watering, selling—so the physical toll on me has started being significant,” Peterkin says.
She also curated the “variety” part of the inventory, perpetuating Ayers’ reputation for carrying everything under the sun. Among the bestsellers: plastic pink flamingos used as lawn decorations and a hose that prevents lint from going down a washing machine’s drain.
“I used to play Stump the Band with my friends,” she says. “If they could come up with an item that I didn’t have, I bought the round [of drinks]. If I had it, they had to buy. My favorite was a darning egg. Most people have no idea what it is. It’s a little wooden egg on a stick that you put up in a sock if you’re going to fix a hole in a sock. That’s probably one of the most unusual items. I’m going to bet that there are very few places that have one in stock anymore. I always drank for free on that one.”
Community Camaraderie
Since Peterkin’s post about the closing, customers and former employees have flocked to offer well wishes and thanks—and pleas of reconsideration. Almost 400 devoted fans commented on the Facebook post, and 1,300 expressed sadness, caring and love through emojis.
“Ayers holds many family memories for so many of us in North Arlington,” one customer wrote. “My dad taking us in often for hardware needs, to have keys cut ‘in the back’ or Mom looking for gardening items. I fondly recall Mr. Ayers dressed up as Santa when I was a kid, handing out Tootsie pops.”
“Westover will not the be same without Ayers,” wrote another.
Devin Hicks, who’s owned Westover Market and Beer Garden for 20 years, calls the neighborhood a haven for small businesses with staying power. He cited Lebanese Taverna, which opened there in 1979, and Lost Dog Café, a fixture since 1985.
“That’s what blew me away when I moved here 20 years ago,” Hicks says. “I still remember walking into Ayers. I couldn’t believe a a place like this existed.”
Lisa Ostroff, who opened Fair Trade Roots gift shop and coffee house in Westover in 2012, hopes another small business opens in Ayers’ spot.
“We’re sad,” Ostroff says about the closing. “We used to go over several times a week, not only because we needed stuff from Ayers, but also Kristy and I would catch up on the local doings in the neighborhood. We all support each other with business decisions and how we make things work.”
Small-Town Vibes
The community is what Peterkin says she will miss the most. Westover is a “small town next to the nation’s capital” where everybody knows and looks after one another, she says.
“I spend so much time standing around talking to people. We get to hear their stories. We get to meet their kids,” she says, adding that Ayers gave countless Arlington teens their first jobs. “We’re part of their family in a little way.”
Next up for her and Kaplan is a whole lot of nothing. They both plan to relax on a beach before figuring out their next steps.
“At some point, I’m probably going to get a job, because I’m not ready to be fully retired,” Peterkin says, although the nature of said job is TBD. “I just would like to not be in charge anymore, and I would like to have two days off in a row, and I would like to live a little easier for a while.”
A Fond Farewell
The closing comes about 18 months after Brown’s Hardware shuttered after 142 years in the City of Falls Church. With Ayers gone, only a few general stores remain in Northern Virginia. In Fairfax County, the Clifton General Store dates to the early 1900s, and the Colvin Run Mill General Store in Great Falls opened around 1890. Loudoun County’s Bluemont General Store opened in the 1840s and the Philomont General Store in 1913.
For Ayers fans, Peterkin has one parting message: “Let them know how grateful we are, how amazing this has been for 49 years. We’re appreciative because we couldn’t have done it without them.”
