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When we enter The Pet Shop, an Oreo-patterned cat is perched from her cardboard throne at the front of the store. 

We learn that her name is Hera. At sixteen years old, she is the store’s goddess. At times, she comes down to let us pet her or kiss us with her nose.

Next to her, two Newfoundland dogs, who span as the store aisle’s width, greet us. Their names were Björn and Kuma — whose names translate to “bear” in Norwegian and Japanese respectively. 

Behind the counter stands their owner, Jim Gentile. While Hera has spent her entire life inside the store, Bjorn and Kuma follow him wherever he goes.

Gentile first bought the shop from a local chain “Big Fish Little Fish” in 1976 and renamed it “The Pet Shop.” The original shop was down the street on 134 Harvard Avenue before he moved to the current location, which was a bigger space, in 1991. It’s his 52nd year on the street. He recalls these dates without a slip or hesitation.

While the early days of the shop sold fish, Gentile has adapted based on the needs of the neighborhood. Allston, he says, is a neighborhood that likes a “mix of everything.” Today, he sells a variety of fish, reptiles and birds along with pet food, fish tanks, and accessories.

Local pet shops, he explains, harbor a special sort of knowledge that is harder to come by at larger chains, such as Petco. Whereas larger chains are more focused on accessories and dry foods, smaller shops focus on the animals themselves.

“You can go into Petco and say, ‘Okay, my fish has ick; it’s a disease,’ and they can hand you a bottle of medication and say, ‘Here, this should fix it.’ When you walk into here, we do the same thing. We take a bottle of medication, tell you what’s going to fix it or how to fix it. And then we tell you why you probably got it, how to avoid getting it again, and the best way to treat the fish that you have,” he says.

While bigger chains often employ students, who work temporarily before they move on, smaller stores are operated by what he calls “lifers.” Lifers accumulate knowledge whether it’s reading the yearly water pamphlet to define the ideal conditions for fish in that area, testing the tap every few weeks to see how it might affect the water in the fish tank, or trying out new ways to feed a snake that refuses to eat. 

“All those types of things take time and effort, and that’s why it’s only the smaller stores, the lifers, who put that effort in,” says Gentile. 

In half an hour, we saw Gentile helping a customer choose a fish, answering the phone to provide advice about snake food, or reassuring a young woman that the rat that she was buying for a friend will not escape the box that he wrapped in tape. He also tells us that he is caring for some snakes from customers, who are abroad for the summer. 

He has also built relationships with other businesses in the building and neighborhood. Toni Fanning, who owns Ritual Arts only a few stores down, says that she bought her 29-year-old grey parrot, Logos, from The Pet Shop. Every once in a while, Gentile walks over to trim his nails and beak.

Gentile previously served as the president of the Allston Board of Trade and was involved in setting up Allston Village Main Streets which is right upstairs in the same building. On this particular day, he is wearing a white shirt with “Allston, Massachusetts” encircling the ZIP code 02134.

“Fifty-two years on the street, my heart is on Harvard Avenue,” he says. “My waking hours are here, and I love this neighborhood. I just do.”

Today, Gentile says that among pet stores, he is practically the only lifer left in the Boston area. Due to the recent changes in ownership within the building, The Pet Shop will close its current location on August 31. Gentile would like to stay in Allston, but he says “it’s not panning out well” and is searching for a new location a little north, such as Malden or Medford.

As he plans to relocate his shop after 52 years, he says that he will miss the relationships that he’s built with his customers. While many of his customers come through his shop on a four-year cycle, there are others that have visited his shop for over 30 years. Even those who move away still find their way back to the shop when they are in town.

“It’s heartbreaking to lose that. I’m using the term lose that, but my heart is saying to have that ripped away from you,” he says.