It was born during the Great Depression and survived fire, flood and recession.

Now, after a little more the 73 years of doing business in Ballard, the family-owned Olsen Furniture will "close forever."

"When people ask why we are retiring, they don't realize that we have been here since we were 10 years old," said Art Olsen, 62, co-owner of Olsen Furniture on Ballard Avenue. "The timing was just right - we've been doing this all of our lives."

Art Olsen owns the company with his brother Dick, 66, sister Sonja, 65 and brother-in-law Bruce Helm. The siblings took over the business their father, Harold Olsen, built from the ground up when he passed away in 1973.

The decision to retire wasn't a matter of not making enough money.

"We've done just fine over the years - it's just ... time. You have to get out there and enjoy life while you can," said Art Olsen, adding that he plans to use his extra time for a few of his great loves - golfing, skiing and being a part of the Ballard community.

As alumni of Ballard High School, the Olsen family has made it a point to support the school through the years. Art Olsen was one of the founding members of the Ballard High Foundation, a charitable organization that helps support the school. Art, Dick, Sonja and Bruce have helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for the school through golf tournaments and contributions.

"Art's given an amazing amount of time and energy (to the foundation)," said Janet Rodgers, director of the Ballard High School Foundation and friend of the Olsen family. "Olsen Furniture may be missed but Art Olsen will be around."

Everything - including the plants - is on sale at the 16,000 square foot store. Inventory is marked from 20 to 67 percent off and the family hopes to have everything sold and the store closed up by April.

Most of the store's 11 employees, some who have been with the company for more than 40 years, are nearing retirement, too.

The Olsen's plan to lease their space out - maybe even to another furniture store. But Art Olsen is a man who likes to keep busy, stay involved and run the show, so he'll keep an office - and a presence - on Ballard Avenue.

"Of course we'll still be in Ballard and involved in the community because we've always been very community minded," he said.

The Olsen spirit

Harold Olsen grew up in Minneapolis, Minn. where he learned the trade of making furniture before coming to Seattle at age 18. Here he held various jobs and worked a stint reupholstering seats for a truck company.

In 1933, at a time of great turmoil for Americans, as companies were going out of business and people couldn't find work, Harold Olsen opened his own furniture store on Ballard Avenue. The store has been located at several locations along the historic street, including where the Olympic Athletic Club is today.

"My father had nothing when he started," said Art Olsen. "But he loved to work."

Throughout the store at 5354 Ballard Avenue pictures of Harold Olsen are hung, posing proudly with his employees in the old furniture shop where they handmade and upholstered furniture. It was the height if the Great Depression and business was hard to come by, so Harold Olsen would go door-to-door asking folks if they needed anything reupholstered.

"That's what they did in those days," said Art Olsen.

In 1949, Olsen Furniture discontinued manufacturing and began selling retail furniture exclusively.

The Olsen kids practically grew up at the store-coming in to dust the shop and help load and unload the delivery truck.

Their father's generous business sense is something family friends still remember today.

It was common for Harold to let customers that couldn't afford to pay right away take furniture home--no money down--just their word they would pay when they could.

"He was a great salesman and he loved people," said Art Olsen of his father. "It didn't matter if the sale was a nickel or a thousand dollars-the person he was dealing with meant the same to him."

Mason Covich and his wife experienced that generosity first hand when they needed furniture as newlyweds. With no money between them-Harold let them take what they needed for a promise of repayment.

"They're just a great family," Covich said, owner of Covich and Williams, a 25-year-old marine and trucking fuel company in Ballard. "To tell you the truth, I don't even think they charged us interest."

When he heard the store was closing, Covich went down to the store and bought a couch-even though he didn't need one.

Art Olsen said he's tried to embody his parents' business values and commitment to community in the way he has run the company.

He holds deep admiration for his mother, Vera Olsen, who was an active member of the Ballard Community Hospital Board before she passed away in 1995.

Both parents helped start the Ballard Boys and Girls Club and were part of the grassroots, door-to-door campaign that helped secure funds for the Ballard Community Hospital-now Swedish Medical Center-in the 1950s.

The end of an "Institution"

The company has been called an "institution," a "model" and a "symbol" of old Ballard, before it was full of trendy shops and popular restaurants and bars. But the company has transcended that, too.

The store's owners have witnessed Ballard's transition from a sleepy blue-collar, maritime community to one of the most popular neighborhoods in Seattle. Art Olsen said he doesn't mind the transition happening here, in fact, his family has been a big part of it.

The Olsen's own property on much of the east side of Ballard Avenue and the west portion of Leary Avenue; from just south of Bergen Place Park on Leary to the new Ballard Landmark Inn site, formerly the Wilson Ford dealership, and on Ballard Avenue from Blackbird men's clothing to the Landmark.

Chai House, Arm Candy, Venue, Damasalfly, Moving Space and Olivine are just a few of the trendy boutiques and caf/'s that occupy the Olsen's property. Over the years the family purchased the space as it came available.

The Olsen's are also known for being particular about the types of businesses they lease space out to. They are approached regularly by restaurant and bar owners dying for a spot on hip Ballard Avenue, but Art Olsen said Ballard already has "really good restaurants" and doesn't plan to bring more in.

"We look for things that fit in with the neighborhood," he said. "Ballard Avenue has changed-it's the hottest spot in town. It used to be sort of skid row."

Furniture stores like Olsen aren't that common anymore. Stores like IKEA, the Swedish furniture and accessory chain that make "cheaper" products, have nearly taken over the industry. But Art Olsen believes there's still a market for "quality" stores like his.

And through the good and the bad, the company has endured.

In 1973, Bruce Helm ran a campaign out of the store for Initiative 282, which rolled back legislative pay increases. He collected more than 700,000 signatures; the most signatures ever gathered for a single ballot measure in the state's history of citizen voter drives. The measure passed overwhelmingly.

When a fire broke out in 2000 at the Sunset Hotel (then next door to the furniture store) Olsen had to close for six months to the repair smoke and water damage.

"This store has gone through a lot-this store has survived," Art Olsen said.

Many multi-generational family businesses in the neighborhood have already shut down; C&C Paint and the Wilson Ford dealership and Nelson Chevrolet, two of the earliest dealerships in the country, are gone too.

"It is interesting...we are one of the last. It's showing our age," he said. "But it's been a two-way street--the community has been good to us and we've been good to the community."

Rebekah Schilperoort may be reached at 783.1244 or rebekahs@ballardnewstribune.com