Starlite Lanes has been run by same family for four generations

By Jason Gabak / Special to The Citizen

AURELIUS- For more than 50 years, Starlite Lanes has been a family-owned and operated business that to this day still has four generations working together under one roof.

Cindi Mendillo, who along with her husband, John, are the full owners of Starlite, said the lanes didn't actually start out as Starlite, or for that matter as a bowling center.

“My great-grandfather, George Vitetta, started this as a restaurant and did banquets here in the '30s or '40s,” Mendillo said. “For a while it was known as Finger Lakes Tavern.”

Mendillo said that by the early 1960s the idea had come up within the family to add on a bowling alley, which Mendillo believes had mixed results at the time.

“I think bowling was getting big at the time,” Mendillo said. “But I think it probably hurt the banquet business. Bowling wasn't like it is now. People kind of thought of it as something different than it is now, it wasn't the family sort of thing that it is today.”

But it was a move that in the long term has more off.

By the early '80s, Mendillo's grandfather, Tony Vitetta, had taken over the business along with his wife, Betty, who to this day works at Starlite as a cook.

By the time she was a pre-teen, Mendillo helped out at Starlite.

“I'd help out setting up for weddings and things like that,” Mendillo said. “By the time I was 16 I was on the payroll and by the time I was 18, I had married my husband and we were pretty much running things. In August we'll be married 25 years and we are the fourth generation to be running things and right now we have the fifth generation of the family working here too.”

In all the years, Mendillo and her family has seen bowling evolve as a sport.

But through it all, Starlite has been fortunate and profitable.

Mendillo believes this is because the lanes has an undeniable dedication to the game, something that's resonated with customers and leagues. The lanes has developed a strong loyalty amongst its bowlers and their families.

Mendillo said that from what she's seen, some of this began years ago with the house's junior leagues, which are going strong with more than 200 youth bowlers taking part this year.

“There are people here that I had in pee-wee bowling,” Mendillo said. “And now they are grown up and they come back here to bowl and some of them are bringing their children who are in the junior league now. You get to see the generations of families that come back here to bowl.”

And despite the tough economic times, Starlite is also doing well with leagues this year.

“We're doing pretty well,” Mendillo said. “Open bowling isn't as big as it has been, but it goes in cycles. Next year maybe more people will be out bowling. But we are doing well with leagues and starting this summer, we decided to keep all our prices the same and I think that has helped a lot.”

Starlite has also been incorporating other opportunities, such as opening up the house to facilities like Seneca-Cayuga ARC and starting leagues like the house's Family Fun league, to help get more family involvement in the game.

But even as the face of bowling has changed, with more and more houses and facilities opening up geared exclusively towards the entertainment side of the game, Starlite still has a deep dedication to the sport of bowling.

“Everything you read will tell you you should do more entertainment, more rock and bowl and things like that,” Mendillo said. “There are places opening up in bigger cities that don't even have leagues, they only do the entertainment side of things. But we decided that we want to stay committed to the leagues and to the bowling association and to work with the sport of bowling and stay committed to that.”

But there is also something more to it, something else that has helped Starlite stay strong all these years.

“We know bowling,” Mendillo said. “There are people here that have been working here 20 or more years and I think people like that. I think people like to know that this is a family business and that this family knows bowling.”