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Six years after starting Simple Little Detail, a craft events, woodworking and decor business, out of their Mastic Beach home, earlier this month the married team of Dan and Danielle De Melfi launched a brick-and-mortar operation in Mastic.
It’s a small shop at 1130 Montauk Highway behind Hollywood Blvd. Hair Salon. But don’t let the size of the building fool you. Simple Little Detail is a bustling small business with 15 employees, including several family members. If they’re not at private events or craft fairs, they are building custom furniture for homes and businesses.
The company recently delivered 13 tables and 30 benches for outside dining at The Garden at Water Mill restaurant and did the countertops for TJ’s Hero Shop in Patchogue.
“Once we make something, we post a picture on our Facebook page and then somebody sees that we do not only do the craft parties. They will ask us to come and make something for them,” said Danielle De Melfi, 38.
Dan, 35, is a carpenter and a William Floyd graduate who does the custom woodwork — from farmhouse tables to benches to cabinets and bean-bag toss games. Danielle, who grew up in Selden and graduated from Commack High School, oversees the parties (there could be up to five a day) and attributes her craft skills to her mother and aunt.
It’s been a year this week since Dan stopped working for a carpenter out east and devoted his energy full time to Simple Little Detail.
Danielle De Melfi said people would say, ‘Oh, my girlfriend had a table made by you.’ Or, ‘I went to one of your parties and I saw one of your tables and I was wondering if you had a store where I could come and see it.” She continued: “Because you’re buying a table. You want to sit at it, you want to feel it, you want to talk to your husband in front of it…. So we kind of threw around opening the store for a while and then I went to my hair salon, Hollywood, and this was for rent. We rented it and hoped for the best.”
“We do furniture, we build furniture, we do blanket ladders. And then I brought in decor, because that’s kind of my love and my passion. I love to decorate. I’ve had women hire us to do their homes,” De Melfi said.
“She always has fresh, new ideas. I love it,” said Josette Gutierrez, of Mastic, who walked into the store Friday and has been to doormat and paint parties with Danielle.
“I’m trying to keep it so that it’s affordable for … people that want these things, but are struggling to make it day by day,” De Melfi said. That’s part of the reason why she decided to open in Mastic, where the rent isn’t so high and the prices can stay lower as a result.
“I’m very big into supporting local companies myself, ever since we even dabbled into this. I’m like, local, local, local.”
An official ribbon-cutting for the store with local officials is set for Sunday.
In the first two days that the store opened, Simple Little Detail rung up 120 sales. “A lot of people were people that follow us, have parties with us or come to an event with us, so it was pretty cool,” De Melfi said. “It was very emotionally overwhelming for me.”
Simple Little Detail
1130 Montauk Highway
Mastic, NY
Wednesday: 11 a.m.-5 p.m.
Thursday-Saturday: 10:30- 5 p.m
Sunday: 10:30-4 p.m.
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