The intersections of Lewis Road and Humboldt Street in Santa Rosa, and Broadway Place and West Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in downtown Los Angeles have nothing and everything to do with one another. The locations are home to a modest neighborhood deli and a global sneaker sensation. Somewhere among the cold cuts and custom kicks is the recipe of running a successful business by following unconventional designs. Dominic Ciambrone, owner of Shoe Surgeon Studios, and his father, Lou Chambrone, owner of Santa Rosa’s Canevari’s Delicatessen & Catering, are teaming up for what proves to be The Shoe Surgeon’s tastiest collaboration yet.
Ciambrone (who uses his family’s original spelling of their surname), a.k.a The Shoe Surgeon, took some giant steps forward since customizing Air Jordans on his grandmother’s sewing machine in the garage of his parents’ Santa Rosa home in his early-twenties. Over the next decade, Ciambrone crafted something of a sneaker empire, customizing shoes for the likes of Justin Bieber and LeBron James and opening the Shoe Surgeon headquarters in downtown Los Angeles in 2015. The company now has several Shoe Surgeon design school locations across the country, with plans of international expansion on the horizon. For all the frequent flier miles Ciambrone accumulates, there is one destination he frequents perhaps more so than the rest, the one he always finds himself coming back to: home. Ciambrone has longed to establish a professional footprint in his hometown.
“I’m working to build a creative studio in Sonoma County for classes and a shoe repair shop,” Ciambrone says. “There’s so much talent in the North Bay, and so many young, creative people. I want to show them that anything is possible.”
Ciambrone’s father, Lou Chambrone, established himself in the Sonoma County food scene decades ago. Ciambrone remembers life as the son of a chef and restaurant owner.
“I never thought of my dad as an entrepreneur; he just worked his ass off. When he worked in the city, we would enjoy the fruits of his labor by playing in the arcade and being on the pier as kids,” Ciambrone says. “When you grow up and have kids, you look at life differently.”
Garage days
Growing up in Santa Rosa, Ciambrone says his parents allowed him the space to grow and develop his artistic inclinations. For the young Ciambrone, it all started with a pair of the classic Nike Air Jordan 1’s his cousin allowed him to wear to school one day. The attention the shoes generated among his classmates sparked a desire for Ciambrone to take his apparel even further. When most seniors were asking for a car as a graduation present, Ciamborne asked for a sewing machine, purchased by his grandmother in 2002.
As the vision of Ciambrone’s passion crystalized, he asked his father for a $3,500 loan to purchase an industrial sewing machine. Chambrone told his son to draw up a business plan as a way to gauge his son’s level of commitment. The young Ciambrone put it on paper and his father agreed to loan him the money. The one-man operation of shoe customizing in a garage for friends and family eventually exploded into a global business with an A-list clientele that includes the likes of J. Balvin, Nelly and Odell Beckham, Jr.
“It was cool that my parents allowed me to be creative and have the freedom to do the things that allowed me to become who I am,” Ciambrone says. “They allowed me to go into their garage and have a place to get my business going.”
Sweet Lou’s
In 2001, Chambrone and his wife, Kim, opened Sweet Lou’s Italian restaurant in downtown Cotati. Ciambrone admits that “he knew life differently then” and had little desire to spend his time as a high school kid in a restaurant.
“I didn’t want to be there, and at a young age you take things for granted. I worked there and helped cook, wash dishes and do deliveries,” Ciambrone says. “I didn’t like the thought of having to be somewhere all the time. This is why I had few jobs growing up because I needed to find my own thing. To my dad’s credit, he would find more creative things for me to do like run deliveries or paint the sign.”
Papa Chambrone knew that restaurant work wasn’t his son’s style. “I had him make a few deliveries here and there,” Chambrone says. “He was mostly around to get him and his friends free food.”
Despite the young Ciambrone’s apprehension to the family business, he says the restaurant brought the family closer together and closer to food.
“We would always have friends over to the restaurants, I remember my youngest brother cooking at the age of 11 and going in on weekends and helping out. What I remembered was how hard my parents worked and how they had an idea and brought it to life,” Ciambrone says. “I took it for granted at that age but looking back at it my dad went from having a salary job to taking a risk and doing something on his own and I’m sure I took something from that subconsciously. Like, if you want to do something you just do it. My mom was very supportive and it was cool to see them work together to build a dream or idea.”
The ability to chart your own course and be your own boss resonated with Ciambrone at an early age during the days of Sweet Lou’s restaurant. He recalls how his father’s creative independence inspired a rather unique design feature in the restaurant. “My dad was creative in so many ways. When he had Sweet Lou’s, he would build different things inside the restaurant,” Ciambrone says. “I got to see if he had an idea, he would just do it. I remember a poker table display with little baby doll arms that he built for people to look at. It was such an old building and he worked with what he had to bring it to life.”
His father recalls assembling the poker table display with items he had laying around at his disposal. “My wife’s grandmother had these expensive dolls that were rare and very life-like. They had kid sized arms on them. I had a poker table, and that’s when poker was getting big on TV. I took the legs off a poker table and took six arms off the dolls and screwed them onto the table with playing cards to make it look like they were all playing,” Chambrone says.
The odd art installation turned heads and started conversations, but it was that “thinking outside the box” mentality that the young Ciambrone picked up from his father’s business endeavors that continue to inspire his own today.
Canevari’s Deli
The Canevari’s name has been in business in Sonoma County since 1929. The deli’s current location was initially purchased in 1939, where a ravioli factory and two small houses were built.
In 1970, the business expanded, adding a deli service to the ravioli operation and quickly becoming one of the premier caterers in Sonoma County. In 2011, Chambrone assumed ownership and operations of Canevari’s, reviving the Santa Rosa institution by incorporating more homestyle Italian items on the menu such as spaghetti and meatballs, the Italian Sub and cannolis.
The venerable mom-and-pop shop has undergone several transformations during its storied history, and Chambrone looks to add to that legacy with a planned transformation for the future of the business with his son. The trio are working on a recipe to blend the deli’s old-school history with a new-school twist.
“The goal with the deli is to have my dad’s food as the No.1 priority and mash that up with the storytelling I’ve been able to do over my lifetime, and having merch and food drops and shoes tied with the food,” Ciambrone says.
Going into business with family isn’t always a recipe for success, however, Chambrone feels comfortable to team up with his son at this point in their careers. Ciambrone admits that working with family was tough in the beginning of his Shoe Surgeon career, but learning how to run a business helped him shape how to properly deal with things. “I learned how to balance the personal and professional,” Ciambrone says. ”I learned how to approach family employees and how to use them for what they are good at, and what they can bring and not just driven by emotion.”
His father has seen the professional growth of his son throughout the years. “He wasn’t a businessman at first. He learned that from trial and error,” Chambrone says.” He really developed as a businessman when he surrounded himself with effective and humble partners.”
A business partner of the father-son duo, Kyle Riggle, says the focus will be on creating a more contemporary environment and something potentially scalable to more restaurants. “There’s an opportunity because of the long history of the deli and its loyal customers,” Riggle says. “Dominic [Ciambrone] has shown that he can drive energy to things that he’s passionate about. Being a part of a story that includes food is something he has talked about for a long time. Dom is a perfectionist almost to a fault. The difference between him now as opposed to early on in his career is that he’s able to recognize that.”
Riggle believes the partnership with the deli can be a strong one because he and Ciambrone are both aligned on “a strong pulse on the market,”and cites previous examples of people from streetwear and high culture venturing into the food business. “I think the crossover of culture and cuisine is more relevant today than ever,” Riggle says.
Possible future plans for the deli include hosting pop-up dinners with world-renowned chefs, collaborations with the Shoe Surgeon brand and potential expansion of Canevari’s locations. A Santa Rosa native, and high school friend and early business partner of Ciambrone with his Shoe Surgeon business, Riggle is excited to lend his expertise of brand development to his local community.
“I’ve been away from Santa Rosa for more than a decade,” Riggle says. “It’s great to come back and apply my skills to an institution in the community. I’m driven by the passion to be able to put my blood, sweat and tears in something and see it play out a little better.”
According to Riggle, one of the challenges and opportunities with rebranding a business like Canevari’s is the risk of losing current customers by trying to appeal to new customers. However, Riggle stresses that one thing that isn’t changing is what the customers are currently coming for—the food—saying that, “the guy behind the pots and pans is still the same.”
Chambrone says his son has been wanting to do another business venture, particularly in his hometown. His father’s success of growing the deli’s revenue as a viable business since he assumed ownership in 2012 was also appealing to Ciambrone. Local friends of Ciambrone would constantly relay praise to him after visiting his father’s deli, another factor that made Ciambrone consider the business venture with his father.
Chambrone estimates that he increased business by an astounding 400%. “I took an old, tired place on the brink of closing and revived it with quality food and service. It wasn’t rocket science,” Chambrone says.
The opportunity for a homecoming has long been a dream for Ciambrone, who credits Sonoma County with shaping his business and the person he is today.
“There are so many magical things about Sonoma County, especially growing up there,” Ciambrone says. “I met Guy Fieri at 21 and spoke to him about what he does and learned about his life as a businessman. To see someone on TV from a small town gave me dreams and hope. Now seeing my family and the business they built and the community surrounding that gave me comfort to keep wanting more. My business is always family—that’s what my family and Sonoma County taught me. Every Thursday at the Shoe Surgeon headquarters we do family meals. We host chefs who come in and tell their story while they cook for us, and it reminds me of my family and dinners at home. When I get my kitchen set up, I’m going to start making meals for people.”
In the meantime, this Santa Rosa kid-turned-shoe doctor continues to put his best foot forward and branch out in a variety of industries, tapping into his unique creative approach that all began with a pair of Air Jordans.
