Vacuum repair, lamps-to-be and more at Phil’s

By TAM PUTNAM & FAITH HANNA

“Forty years ago,” Vicki Evans says, “I could have sold you a $100 Hoover you would have kept and passed on to your firstborn.”

Evans, who runs Phil’s Electric in Cow Hollow — and serves many in the neighborhoods along Fillmore Street — remembers that back then, almost every neighborhood in San Francisco had a specialized vacuum cleaner store. When a vacuum failed in its job of inhaling dust and pet hair, customers just brought the machine back to the store for repair. 

Phil Sidari’s business in 1941 was even more specialized — he crafted artificial limbs for returning World War II vets. The job evolved into making and, later, selling appliances at a store he put his name on. Vicki’s husband, Bob Evans, bought Phil’s Electric in the late ’70s, and moved the store to the corner of Lombard and Baker a few years later. Vicki’s two sons and a longtime employee themselves specialize: one repairs lamps, another works on vacuums and the third on food processors, rice cookers and other appliances.

The store’s aisles are stocked with small, specific and — to a layperson — obscure electric parts. One little room is lined with lamps-to-be, a house specialty. Customers bring in objects — an old shoe, a watering pot, a mannequin leg — which Vicki’s son Tom fashions into arty lighting.

The team sells only what Vicki calls “respectable merchandise” from brands like Miele and Tacony (not Shark! Tom cautions, as a visitor eyes a robot vacuum cleaner for sale). Those companies make products they can stand behind, Vicki says. 

I ask her if environmental concerns make people more amenable to repair. “People only consider repair if they believe they have a good product,” she replies. “I don’t think you’re going to repair a $49 vacuum.”

This article is part of a series produced by reEnvisionRepair, an eco-conscious group that has interviewed and photographed more than 40 local repair businesses since 2018, celebrating the art of preservation.