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For nearly 60 years, as the landscape of the Bangor Waterfront has gone from the bustling railway depot and a swath of abandoned buildings, to the busy public park, marina and regional entertainment mecca of today, one business there has stayed constant: Saliba’s Rug Sales & Service.
Saliba’s — instantly recognizable from the red “magic carpet” sign on the sides of its huge stucco building at the corner of Pleasant and May streets — moved to the Waterfront in 1962 and is one of only a few remaining decades-old, family-owned businesses in the Bangor area.
Last month, however, Saliba’s moved out of its longtime Bangor home to a new location at 183 Robertson Blvd. in Brewer. Its sister business, Saliba’s Rug Cleaners, is now located on Hillside Avenue in Bangor, near the Broadway Hannaford.
“It’s a 28,000-square-foot building. We just do not need that much space. The business has changed so much, and we don’t need to keep that kind of inventory anymore,” said Steve Saliba, 73, who took over the business from his father, Sam Saliba, in 1986. “We’re all a little tired of climbing three flights of stairs.”
Saliba sold the building in February to local architect Robert Ervin, owner of Bangor-based Ervin Architecture, who intends to redevelop the structure, built in 1875, over the next year or two for mixed commercial and residential use.
“The building is almost 150 years old, and I am only the third owner in all that time,” Ervin said. “Things really have been kept in the family here, over the generations.”
Saliba’s Rug Sales began life as Christmas Rug Company — started in 1925 by William Christmas and his son, Philip, members of Bangor’s large Lebanese immigrant community — initially importing rugs and other textiles. In 1939, Sam Saliba, a cousin to the Christmas family who was raised in Florida, came to visit the family in Bangor. Aside from serving in the Navy during World War II, he never left, officially joining the family business after coming back from the service.
By 1950, Sam Saliba and his wife and business partner Ruth had purchased the rug-cleaning part of the business from Philip Christmas, and in 1960, took over the sales part as well. The business grew rapidly in that time, and Saliba ran out of room at his Birch Street location in Bangor.
In 1962, he purchased what was known as the McLaughlin Warehouse on the waterfront, and it quickly became the leading carpet, rug, flooring and drapery retail outlet in the region. While rolled, broadloom carpet was the company’s bread and butter, Saliba’s still today specializes in new and antique oriental rugs, imported from Iran, Turkey, Pakistan and other Middle Eastern countries, and sourced from antique auctions.
“I call them floor paintings,” Sam Saliba said in a 1979 interview. “They’re works of art.”
Steve Saliba started working for his father the year the business moved to the waterfront, when he was 14. In 1986, he took over the business after his dad retired, and after the family had sold the cleaning part of the company in 1978, to a fellow member of the Bangor Lebanese community, Conrad Karam.
The Karam family still owns the cleaning business, but has kept the highly recognizable Saliba name, and was located in the same building as the sales operation until both moved this year.
In 1993, Steve’s son, David, joined the rug sales business, and in 1994, Sam Saliba passed away.
“The building has been a part of my life for almost my entire life,” Saliba said. “I can’t even think of all the stories there are to tell.”
Though many people identify Saliba’s by its stucco exterior, that facade was actually installed in 1980. The building is constructed from brick and steel, and has 30 large windows lining the walls — attractive, but exceptionally drafty, with heating bills in the late 1970s of up to $8,000 per season (about $27,000 in 2021, adjusted for inflation). Sam Saliba in 1980 worked with local engineers and contractors to board over the exterior with insulation and a stucco finish, cutting the heating bill for the large space in half.
Times have changed, however, and while Saliba’s still does a robust business, especially in commercial carpeting, it has not needed the amount of space the warehouse provides for some time. Saliba quietly put the building up for sale several years ago, but did not receive any viable offers and took it off the market. When Erwin approached Saliba about purchasing it at the beginning of this year, he jumped at the opportunity.
“It’s a win-win for both of us, because we were ready to move, and it’s the last viable property on the waterfront that isn’t owned by Bangor Savings or the city,” Saliba said. “There’s a lot of potential here.”
The only other privately owned buildings on the waterfront are the Sea Dog Brewing Company, the condominiums at 24 Pleasant St., and two commercial spaces across the street from the Sea Dog, as well as the Hollywood Casino complex near Interstate 395.
With the company’s move to Brewer, Steve and David Saliba hope they have secured the business’s legacy for years to come. What started as a small import business is now, 96 years later, a legacy Bangor company still owned by the same family.
“We’re pretty lucky,” Steve Saliba said.