The Trancas Market Shopping Center fixture was shuttered last week with a last-minute fire sale.
By Michael Aushenker / Special to The Malibu Times
As of this week, only one HOWS Market, part of a small chain founded in 1999, remains in business Š and it’s in Pasadena.
Malibu’s HOWS Trancas Market became the latest casualty of the California supermarket chain’s misfortunes. The store opened in Malibu in 2000.
Last year, the Torrance and Granada Hills locations of HOWS closed. The Malibu location joined them last week, emptying out a day earlier than expected by Tuesday night. With fire-sale deep discounts, HOWS attracted a last-minute frenzy of customers to scavenge the market and clear the shelves. Shoppers at Trancas appeared stunned and some were aware that another market might be taking its place.
“HOWS will be missed,” Grace Jantz said. “The small town surfer feel will certainly be decimated by the developer’s vision. I am sure the new store will not allow you to walk in barefoot to buy a sandwich or a six-pack of beer. Shoes and shirt will be required!”
“The last time I shopped there a week ago, I got 40 percent off a bag of groceries,” Malibu resident Cathy Louis said.
The defunct market’s name, HOWS, was an acronym for the late Roger Hughes, an heir of the Hughes Market fortune, Mark Oerum, the man who was in charge of store operations, David Wolff, owner of the Pasadena store, and coowner Steve Strickler.
Rumors surrounding HOWS’ demise had been swirling since December 2010, although the storeowners declined to comment on it. According to recent reports, the Missouri-based Rosch Company will oversee the revamping of the Trancas center, due to be completed next summer.
Twentysomething friends Amy Burch and Tania Morosan were bummed out that HOWS was no longer open. Morosan had just returned from vacation to learn that the market was closing. She said she’s been coming to Malibu for the last eight summers and it was very convenient when hitting Leo Carrillo or Zuma Beach.
“This is the place you’d go if you forgot something,” Morosan said. “It was always my safety.”
Burch, who liked to buy her Pringles there, added, “It’s just kind of sadŠ[HOWS closing has] left a little dent [in the community].”
Across the lot at Starbucks, Doug Edman mused, “I came down to get some pitted dates. I went to buy them and they were closing the store.”
Edman’s friend, Jim Simon, visits the Trancas Starbucks often.
“I was surprised,” he said. “I’m not a local but I came to buy a sandwich.”
Over the weekend, people continued to react to the store’s sudden departure. Max Stefanelli, managing partner of Terroni Restaurant in West Hollywood, has been vacationing near Malibu all month with his family.
“I sent someone over to pick up something and it was closed,” he said. “I was very surprised.”
Sal Cirnigliaro lives in Agoura Hills but has long been involved with the Malibu Kiwanis Chili Cook-Off, Carnival and Fair. He shared his fond memories of the store.
“Any time we were down by the Christmas tree lot, we’d always go in there,” he recalled. “It was a really nice place. It was part of the community. It’s not just a Ralphs or a Vons. It was the type of market [you find] when you live in a small community.
“They were always nice to us when went up for a fundraiser. It’s a shame that they’re gone.”
Malibu mom Catherine Dao, who has a nine-year-old son, said she remembered that she used to go to Cook’s, which preceded what is now Pavilions, further south on Pacific Coast High at Point Dume Village. She added that she would miss HOWS because it was a market where she could use her eScript card to buy certain products and donate a percentage to her son’s school in the process.
“It’s a little pricey,” local artist Nessa Perman of Point Dume said of HOWS. “But it was a great place to go if you didn’t want to run into anyone.”
Meanwhile, at the Starbucks across from the vacated market, early on Saturday night, the coffee outlet’s patios and interior were packed, in stark contrast to the market’s vast, desolate parking lot, where, every few minutes, a car would pull up and its passengers would empty out and walk up to the HOWS entrance, and then turn away.