Storefront: NJ 4
March 28, 2011
Storefront: NJ 4
Words: Rob Brink
The Skateboard Mag, May 2011
Chris Nieratko and Steve Lenardo had been waiting for something to open up in Princeton, NJ for over three years when an existing skate shop closed its doors in early 2010. Simply put, they jumped on the vacancy and NJ 4 Skate Shop was born.
“We’d never open in a town with another skate shop,” Nieratko says. “There are far too few mom and pop stores making it these days. It’s a small skate community out here. We wouldn’t want to hurt anyone's business or bum people out.”
Life long friends, Steve and Chris always open stores in the towns they used spend their youth skating in.
“We grew up skating Sayreville (NJ 1),” says Nieratko. “As we got older we'd take buses to New Brunswick (NJ 2). Every skater from Jersey from our generation started their NYC sessions at the Lackawanna ledges in Hoboken (NJ 3). Princeton was another great college town filled with spots that we used to hit.”