CINCINNATI (AP) - After making fezzes for 103 years, a company is getting out of the business of the ornate hats that are a signature of Masons and Shriners.
Cincinnati Regalia is among a handful of companies that specialize in making sashes and bejeweled felt hats specifically for those groups. But a decline in membership has reduced demand.
"The average age of a Mason is 60, so what does that tell you?" said Beverly Riedling, whose family has owned the store for 30 years. "When they are in that age range, they already have everything we have to offer."
Shriner membership has declined to 567,351 in 1997 from 798,734 in 1988, according to the international headquarters of Shriners of North America. But spokesman Mike Andrews says the drop has been slowing.
There isn't enough of a market to support all regalia businesses, said Ron Plask, co-owner of D. Turin, a Miami-based fez maker.
"That's the way the fraternal business is - it's not good," he said.
When Riedling's father, Henry T. Vittetoe, bought the store, production and sales of the ceremonial Masonic & Shrine fezzes and sashes generated most of the revenue.
Riedling said the fez store will close June 30. However, she is buying the company's thriving flag and banner business and moving it within Fettner-Friedman Furs, four floors below in the same downtown Cincinnati building.
She is taking just one of her approximately 20 employees to the new Cincinnati Flags and Banners business that is to open July 1.
Her father, in his 70s, is retiring, as are many of the women who work the sewing machines and stitchery tables in Cincinnati Regalia's back room. The full-time workers are to be placed in other jobs, and the store's machinery is to be sold, Riedling said.
The women, some in their 80s, have for generations stitched silver and gold bullion, sequins and gems onto felt hats and around hand-embroidered letters and symbols. A fez can take a week to make and cost hundreds of dollars.
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