Nearly 70 years ago, Charlie Rose started repairing baseball gloves in his spare time at home as a sideline to his television repair shop. The TVs are long gone, but Charlie Rose Baseball in San Jose lives on as the go-to specialty store for everything you need to play and love America’s great national pastime.
With an expanded and refreshed inventory, the shop marked its Nov. 15 relaunch under new owners Wes Fahmy and Brandon Vallance. They’ve stepped in as proud stewards of this longstanding business and tradition of quality and service.
“A lot of people have told us the store looks so much better,” Vallance told San José Spotlight. “It’s so much brighter, more vibrant, with so much more energy. It’s a place where everyone can come and enjoy baseball.”
Rose once served as mayor of Campbell and was twice elected to the Campbell City Council. But among the younger baseball players, he was known more for breaking in, mending and re-lacing gloves.
“The guy was a character and loved the game of baseball,” Steve Piechota, whom the new owners characterize as their mentor in the business, told San José Spotlight. “I run into people to this day who tell me, ‘I used to go to his house to pick up my gloves.'”
The service proved so popular that Rose decided to expand it into its own business and opened Charlie Rose Baseball in 1958. At that time, Fahmy said, no one else in the Bay Area was doing glove repair. The business swelled, allowing Rose to branch out into equipment and uniforms.
When Rose died in 1986, the business was sold to Pat McCann, a sporting goods representative he had bonded with over their love of the game. But when organized sports suddenly halted during the COVID-19 pandemic, the store suffered a severe loss of sales, already in decline as Amazon took more of the market away from independent retailers.
“Pat shut down team sales and he never had the energy to start it back up,” Piechota said. “Then he decided to sell the store. In my opinion, he was ready for a change and wanted to clean the slate.”
Vallance, who had children in Little League, had met Fahmy, a coach, and they bonded. So when the store came up for sale, it was a natural match. They reestablished relationships with vendors and focused on expanding inventory. They also reengaged with the 100 or so Little League teams in the area, and Vallance, who is also a sports photographer, will be adding team photo days and action shots as services.
“Historically, little leagues would have gotten things like their jerseys, pants, socks, helmets and cleats from different places,” Fahmy told San José Spotlight. “We’ve created a one-stop store for each Little League team, which is a complete game changer.”
It is difficult to think of anything related to baseball that Charlie Rose doesn’t have. The range covers boys’ and girls’ teams, adult sports and some memorabilia.
Everything about the inventory is top-notch. Besides Wilson, the store carries all the major brands, such as Baseball Lifestyle 101, Baseballism, Absolutely Ridiculous and ChalkTalk SPORTS, along with Marrucci and Tucci standard and torpedo bats.
Glove repair is still a major draw for the store, along with breaking in gloves, which Vallance said most people would otherwise accomplish by running it over several times with a car.
“We’ve got a $10,000 machine that does the work,” Fahmy said. “There are only 10 of them in the U.S. We can take your brand new glove and get it fully broken in, steamed and game-ready within a few hours.”
The shop can also repair gloves as the original laces wear out and break, or when Little Leaguers change team names and want to choose new laces from a selection of 23 colors.
Charlie Rose Baseball even carries gloves made by Wilson in a kaleidoscope of brilliant colors inspired by seed flavors such as Smokehouse BBQ, Hatch Chile and Dill Pickle. Each eye-catching glove comes with a matching spit can in a similar design.
Reopening day was a major success, with Fahmy estimating more than 500 customers coming in for a look. And not surprisingly, the store’s vast line of sunflower seeds turned out to be the biggest seller among the younger crowd.
“The new ownership is awesome,” customer Brian Doore told San José Spotlight. “They’re more out there for the community. When you walk in, they make an effort to talk to you and genuinely want to help you out. They’re just friendly guys who are invested in the baseball community. It’s the home of baseball as far as I’m concerned.”
Contact Robert Eliason at [email protected].
Editor’s Note: The Biz Beat is a series highlighting local small businesses and restaurants in Silicon Valley. Know a business you’d like to see featured? Let us know at [email protected].
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