At least one loyal customer isn’t surprised that building and landscape supply store Corriveau-Routhier has shut its doors after 70 years.

“It was a great source of supplies that we needed, had been great for a long time. But over the past maybe two years, it was harder to get material. It got to the point where you’d walk in and there’d be nothing in stock. You almost couldn’t order anything,” said Chris Wivle, owner of CRW Landscaping, which was just up the street from Corriveau-Routhier’s North State Street store.

The Concord store quietly shut last fall and, although it has sported a “closed until spring” sign ever since, there were reports that the company was consolidating to its two remaining stores, in Manchester and Nashua.

But those stores are now closed, and the phone numbers for all stores lead to the same message, which says “all locations . . . are closed” and tells people who have “pending orders” to leave a message.

Messages from the Monitor to the company have not been returned.

The business dated to 1944, when Al Corriveau began a firm “hand pouring concrete blocks which he sold from door to door,” according to the company’s official history. He was joined by Leon Routhier to create a business selling everything from patio flagstones to granite blocks. It dealt both with contractors and homeowners.

The company at one point had five stores and called itself the largest masonry supply company in Northern New England.

In recent years, it had consolidated to stores in Concord, Manchester and Nashua.

All businesses related to construction and building renovation were hit hard by the Great Recession, which affected contractors who were a large part of the customer base of stores like Corriveau-Routhier.

Adjoining Swenson Granite Co. has expressed informal interest in the Corriveau-Routhier building, which is adjacent to its own Concord store and once was owned by the venerable Concord quarry.

As for Wivle, he’ll miss the convenience of Corriveau-Routhier, which was just five minutes from his office, but is happy that he has another locally owned alternative: Dirt Doctors, on Keith Avenue in Pembroke.

“I’m glad the Dirt Doctors in town – they’ve got all the lines and stuff that we need,” he said. “It’s a great place to go to.”

(David Brooks can be reached at 369-3313, dbrooks@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @GraniteGeek.)

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