McDONOUGH – After 15 years of business, Tom and Mary Gorman, owners of the McDonough General Store, have born the blows of a harsh economy and have been forced to throw in the towel, resolving to close their store at the end of the month.

The decision to close comes with hesitation and a heavy heart for the couple, who have spent more than a decade building memories and special relationships in the community. After exploring other options and being denied business loans to keep the doors open, the Gormans made the difficult decision late last month to close.

“We used to always have a small crowd in here,” Tom Gorman said, observing that crowds have slowly dwindled over the years. While business decreased, the costs of licensing and other operational fees have risen, leading them to make cuts and recently lay off four part-time employees. “We’ve done everything we could and hung on as long as we could; we just couldn’t go any further,” he added.

The shelves are running bare and some store equipment has been removed, leaving behind voids once occupied by Pepsi products and Hershey’s Ice Cream. Plenty of hardware items remain in the back of the store and essential items will continually be stocked until the store closes on Feb. 29, said Mary Gorman, but she stopped ordering non-essentials earlier this month in hopes of selling what’s left.