"It feels very sad," said store manager Marta De La Hoya.
After more than 70 years as one of the only department stores in East Los Angeles, the First Street Store is going out of business.
"This store has been here since 1924, and it used to be a really good department store, where we used to carry everything," said De La Hoya.
De La Hoya has been working at the store -- also known as La Primera -- since 1978. She says the owners simply couldn't make it work.
"A lot of competition with the big department stores, the malls," said De La Hoya. "We just couldn't compete with their prices."
Along with fierce competition from Wal-Mart and dollar stores, De La Hoya says young customers stayed away.
"The truth is, people just don't come here anymore," said young customer Casey Bonilla.
Bonilla says her friends went elsewhere.
"Sometimes people think the clothes here are for poor people, but it's really not," said Bonilla.
These days, the going out of business sale feels more like a wake, with longtime customers coming to pay their final respects.
"When I came the first time, I remember -- I was maybe four, five -- there was no wood on the floor. There was sawdust," said longtime customer Tina Martinez.
"I used to come here and bug her for this, and bug her for that, and this brings back a lot of memories as a kid," said longtime customer Victor Seliz.
The store is set to close on Dec. 31, or as soon as all the merchandise is gone. By the look of it, that can happen any day now.
