Max & Gino’s closes its store on Broadway

After being a part of the Hewlett community for 18 years — and at its current site on Broadway for the last seven — Max & Gino’s will close its doors on Aug. 31. The store is relocating to a smaller retail space in the Walt Whitman Mall in Huntington Station. Its Woodbury location will remain open.
The women’s and girls’ clothing boutique is best known for its vintage concert merchandise, such as T-shirts and denim jackets, and Butter Super Soft, a brand of casual-wear sweatshirts and T-shirts.
Store manager Kelly Ford cited the size of the Broadway store as the reason for the move. “This location is too big,” she said. “I know I’m sad to leave here. We’re just not the right fit here anymore at this spot. We have a lot of merchandise, but we also have even more retail space not being used effectively that we could better arrange at a different location. If we were to come back to Hewlett someday, it would definitely have to be in a smaller location.”
Store clerk and Hewlett High School alumna Hayley Siegel, 19, has worked at Max & Gino’s since 2012. She plans to work at the mall store until she leaves in January to study at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising in Los Angeles.
“Through working here, I’ve made many great new connections into the fashion industry, including help for starting my own clothing line,” Siegel said. “The store owner, Mitch Feig, helped me a lot with that. He also helped me obtain an internship at a showroom in New York City. I don’t know what my life would be like if I never came to work here.”

Michella Briggio, another sales clerk, has worked at the Hewlett store for four years. Briggio, 21, who will also move to the Huntington Station location, said she believes her job has helped her mature. “When I first started here, I was really shy,” she said. “Working here helped with my people skills. We’re all really comfortable with each other. It’s also taught me how to know what a person’s individual style is, and make a great shopping experience for them.”
That includes knowing, and meeting the needs of, the store’s Orthodox Jewish customers. “Our religious customers wear very specific dress,” Briggio said. “We had to know what they were allowed to wear, which was no tank tops or strapless dresses. They can’t show their shoulders or wear short sleeves. Just knowing this type of information made their shopping experience less stressful and also made them feel comfortable.”
Lauren Dana, a Hewlett High graduate from North Woodmere, remembers receiving Max & Gino’s “famous” Butter Super Soft sweatshirts as birthday gifts beginning when she was 10, and also as Hanukkah presents. “Around every birthday or holiday I would go into the store and pick one out for my parents to buy me,” she said. “They came in all colors, with all different designs and rhinestones.”
Customers such as Elissa Candiotti, also of North Woodmere and Hewlett High, said she would remember the boutique for its sense of style and convenience. “Growing up in Hewlett, Max & Gino’s was always the go-to place for the newest and trendiest clothing,” Candiotti said. “I remember in my teen years, buying my first Soft Butter sweatshirt when I couldn’t even wait until I exited the store to put it on. I’m sure for many, it’s a close to an era that will be remembered.”
Woodmere native Tyler Gildin included a reference to Max & Gino’s in his 2010 parody video “Nassau State of Mind.” “I included Max & Gino’s in the Nassau music video because of how often I saw girls walking around town carrying those iconic leopard shopping bags,” he said. “It also didn’t hurt the fact that the store rhymed with my favorite deli, Tamburino’s.”

What are your memories of Max & Gino’s? Send them to jbessen@liherald.com.