‘He Is Part of the Fabric of This Town’: C&H Auto, New Canaan Bid Farewell to Leo Lopez

Fourteen years later, C&H Automotive owner Steve Gaeta remembers clearly the day that Leo Lopez answered an ad to apply for a job at the Main Street gas station and repair shop.

C&H Automotive’s Steve Gaeta, Leo Lopez and Sean Brennan on Jan. 6, 2016. Credit: Michael Dinan

Lopez, an Ecuador native now 54 years old, had been in the United States just a few years when he filled out an application and returned a day or two later with 2-year-old Crystal, the youngest of his three kids, in tow.

“He came back and said, ‘Sir, I really need this job,’ ” Gaeta, also a New Canaan firefighter, recalled Wednesday afternoon from the small office at C&H, a mainstay of downtown New Canaan that’s carved out a niche for superior customer service.

“I hired him that day. I saw a good man that just wanted to work. He wanted a job. He describes what he does here as a ‘gas attendant,’ but it’s more than that. He’s a friend. I think he’s a family member. He’s honest. He’s fair. He’s kind. He’s everything that an employer could ask for, and more.”

Next Friday, Jan. 15, will mark Lopez’s final day at C&H Auto, as he plans to move down to Florida to join his two sons, wife and daughter in Miami. His departure from New Canaan and C&H marks the end of a small era in the town, and a goodbye to one of its friendliest, most well-liked people. A send-off for Lopez is planned for 9 p.m. Saturday at Roger Sherman Inn, Gaeta said, and everyone is invited (“Come in and have a drink and wish him well”).

“The winter has hit me very hard in the last three years and my sons say for almost 10 years we have not been together,” Lopez said in the halting English that greets regular customers at the Gulf station. “The family is there. My older son, he already is in university. He says, ‘Dad, I have a good position now, please come here. It’s time.’ My wife, my daughter, they like Florida.”

A job in packaging for a sweetened condensed milk company awaits Lopez in Miami, he said, though he doesn’t expect to forge the types of bonds he has at C&H—with Betty, Tobey, Steve, Sean and others—or with the shop’s customers.

Asked what he would say to those customers, Lopez said: “I don’t have customers. The customers, I think I have customers a long time ago. I have friends now. Everybody, we have a good relationship. It’s really, really hard.”

His responsibilities at C&H include all gas reconciliation, Gaeta said and “there is never a penny discrepancy.”

“He’s 100 percent on the money, every time.”

Sean Brennan of C&H, a 1991 New Canaan High School graduate, called Lopez “one of the best people I’ve worked with.”

“He’s Been there every day, never said ‘No’ to any task,” Brennan said. “Always polite, courteous and willing to give a helping hand.”

Hans Eschricht, a New Canaanite for 40 years and longtime customer of C&H (with his Saab), said of Lopez, “He’s the best. We’re going to miss him tremendously.”

Lopez said he’s struggling emotionally with the idea of leaving C&H and New Canaan, and is trying to focus on his work and stay busy to get through these final days.

Gaeta also is having difficulty imagining the shop without Lopez there.

Asked to describe the relationship Lopez has formed with C&H customers, Gaeta said: “You have to see it to believe it, because people—they love him. He is part of the fabric of this town. There is conversation. There is a trust that he has with his customers.”

Gaeta added: “Everybody that works here, it’s a long-term deal. I’ve owned it for 26 years. Sean is here 16-plus. Leo, 14 years. Leo is responsible for half of my success here, and I owe it to him, and I don’t know that I am going to be able to replace that quality.”