Ski shop on its final run

It's not fair, really, how much of Jeffrey Fiorini's life has depended on the weather.

When it snowed and snowed 37 years ago, Fiorini's father, Buzz, pulled him out of the University of Washington so he could help him with the family ski store at Seattle's University Village. Two years ago, when Jeff had had enough, there was nary a dusting of snow. He couldn't afford to retire. The weather again.

But last year was a white year, which means Jeff Fiorini, 55, is taking his final run through a store now decorated with bright sale fliers (50 to 75 percent off!), asking customers if he can help with anything before he goes. For good.

Fiorini Sports, the oldest tenant in University Village, is closing April 15. With it ends a chapter in Seattle's long history of all things outdoors. If you needed skis or boots, you went to Fiorini.

And if you needed lessons, well, it was Fiorini, too: The family operates a ski school at the Summit at Snoqualmie.

The school will stay open, under the guidance of Jeff's sister, Georgianne. But once the store is emptied, there will be one less place where those who went as kids will be able to bring their own. One less place where shopping is more tradition than transaction.

It's just time marching on. Change. The inevitable. It's a loss, and the sale is more a wake than anything.

"It's unfortunate that stores like this are going by the wayside," Fiorini said the other day. "The customers are saddened that I won't be here, but they're glad for me, too."

Understand, this is a man who was skiing not long after he started walking. His first pair of skis (red wood, with leather lace-up boots) are in a glass case in the back room.

He was in junior high when he started working for the family business, engraving people's names in their plastic and fiberglass skis — sometimes all night.

"My father would work late and not come in until sometimes 11 at night," Fiorini said. "And if he promised something for the next morning... ."

By the time Fiorini was attending Franklin High School, the family had three stores.

He was studying architecture and mechanical drawing at the University of Washington when, in 1972, his father said he needed him at the store.

"I wasn't really focused anyway, at that age," he said. "And it was great fun selling adult toys. If my father owned a carpet business or a paint store, it wouldn't have been the same."

He served customers named Gates, McCaw and Nordstrom. And, one day, he served a woman named Sally Henry, who came in to return a tennis dress with a red band that bled after just one wearing.

"She asked for the manager," he said. "That was me."

They have been married 24 years. And their daughter, Risa, will be staying in college.

Jeff Fiorini's plans are starting to fill up. Golf. His beloved bass guitar and jazz music.

First stop, though, is New Zealand. The man who has outfitted thousands of people for winter trips has never been able to take one himself.

Even better, it's summer there now. Not a single snowflake.

Nicole Brodeur's column

appears Tuesday and Friday.

Reach her at 206-464-2334 or nbrodeur@seattletimes.com.

She's still healing from the board.