Community Corner
Tailor Relocates But Stays in Storm-Ravaged West End
Adnan Etike is confident his business will survive.
Long Beach tailor Adnan Etike is determined to remain in business, so much so that he moved his shop from one area of the West End to another after Hurricane Sandy.
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“I have no question or fear about business coming back,” said Etike at his new storefront at 933 W. Beech St. on Tuesday.
For five years his Adnan’s Custom Tailoring was located down the block, at 1052 W. Beech, but then the storm hit in October. Days later, while he continued to clean his shop that sustained $50,000 in damages, he told Patch his status there depended on whether his landlord would rebuild.
But Etike on Tuesday said he grew tired of waiting for his landlord to return his phone calls and started to make alternative plans, especially after he was unable to obtain a loan or other financial assistance. One day while driving on West Beech he spotted a “For Rent” sign in a window, the site of a former printing business. By February, he moved into his new storefront and remains confident he’ll survive.
“I’m going to be good because I am the only European tailor on the Long Beach island,” he said.
He was able to purchase new sewing machines and the tables on which he alters dresses or suits or creates them whole from raw materials. But other labor-saving devices, such as a buttonhole machine that comes with a $10,000 price tag, are still too expensive for him to buy now.
Etike, 55, move to Riverside Boulevard in Long Beach directly from his native Turkey in 2001. He worked for different tailors before he opened his store in the West End. Today, he still works long hours each day, from about 8 a.m. to 7 p.m., but as long as he remains in his adopted city he’s content.
“Too many people told me Long Beach is gone, go to Queens,” he said. “I told them, ‘no, no, no. I’ve been in this town for many years. I love this town.’”
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