The Main Street Skate Shop is one of Farmingdale's newest businesses geared toward the popular extreme sport, skateboarding.

Locally owned and operated by a father and son team, their goal is to provide the new generation with a place to outfit equipment, apparel and be a channel for the subculture sport.

The Main Street Skate Shop opened its doors on May 29. Months after what was once just a dream for the two, has now turned into reality.

"Owning a skate shop is really a fun job right now," said owner Nick Fugarazzo, who used to work in the computer industry as a project manager, but after the company downsizing, he took a chance and opened the store.

Fugarazzo's son, also named Nicholas, and his daughter, Emily have been into skateboarding since the 1990s. The elder Fugarazzo coaches a hockey team that his daughter plays for and he is just as supportive for her skateboarding as he is for her hockey playing. His wife is a Nassau County Police Officer and they have lived in Farmingdale since 1987 and raised both their children here.

"We are very happy with the store right now and it has been a lot of fun for us," said the elder Fugarazzo.

He and his son Nicholas used to visit similar skate shops in neighboring towns on Long Island, with a growing idea that owning a shop of their own would be cool and also something they would both be good at.

"We didn't expect to make a killing when we opened," said the elder Fugarazzo, "but the time was right."

Once the location was picked renovations began in the first week of April and "some of the local kids helped out by scraping the floors to get the place ready," said Fugarazzo

"This is all new to us and we are learning as we are going," he said, "but it has been a good time so far."

Most people come into the shop and are looking to have a board made up especially for them, with new wheels, trucks, bindings and even custom grip tape jobs all done at the shop. Both father and son are the handy men around the shop and are more than happy to get a skateboard just right for a person's size and weight.

Others come in and place orders for whole new decks because they either skated until the board cracked in half or they need a new deck to get back into the sport for fun or for the first time altogether.

"I have met a lot of really great kids, nice parents and the community has really been good to us," said elder Fugarazzo.

"We have a niche market and we don't rely on just foot traffic, people come to us and they come to us for a reason," said Fugarazzo. Skateboarding is a sport for some and a way of life for others. New avenues have opened for the sport, like Allen Parks' skate park that opened last year. The local park has been a huge catalyst of spawning interest in the cultural aspect and sporting side of skateboarding in local youths in the community and for future generations.

The younger Fugarazzo worked at the park in its first season and said the park is a "fun place with a mellow atmosphere."

Now he works part-time at the skate shop with his father and is currently attending NYIT at Old Westbury, enrolled in a communication arts program, studying film and video editing. He hopes one day to make movies but for now he is fine with just filming skate videos with his friends. One video he put together was footage of his friends skating local New York skate spots and the video will be available for sale at the Main Street Skate Shop sometime in December.

The video footage he shoots is mainly of members of the shop's Main Street Skate Team, comprised of Joe Ziti, Chris Hansen, Taylor Maercher and Luke Melaney and a number of other local kids.

"We all really just skate together though," the younger Fugarazzo said, talking about a larger group of skaters who don't ride for the team.

"The idea of a skate team is for future competitions and demonstration," he said.

The Main Street Skate Team will be riding on shop decks provided by the store and they will bear the shop's logo. These shop decks will be available for the public to buy within the month at the store.

"Support for the local scene," is important the younger Fugarazzo said and he feels it is important to keep a constant flow of new products in the store, from local brands of clothing to local bands music and skate videos. The store also holds national brand skate sneaker lines, other clothing and magazines, videos, music and of course any and all other skateboarding related tools and accessories.

"My biggest worry is that maybe we are expanding a little too fast," said elder Fugarazzo.

"The store went from holding only four different shoes brands to nine," he said and that is just from when they opened in May. The shop also is expanding their female clothing line and is currently stocking their winter apparel line now for the back-to-school rush.

Farmingdale's Main Street Skate Shop is located at 193 Main St., next door to Annabella's Restaurant. They are open from 2-9 p.m., Monday-Friday and 12-9 p.m. on Saturdays. For more information call 694-3077 or email mainstreetskate@optonline.net.