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Show ' - . THE PARK RECORD www.parkrecord.com , WEDTHURSFRIJULY 9-1 1,2003 B A-ll BUSINESS EDITOR: Monika Guendner 649-9014 ext 1 10 , X businessparkrecord.com QjflSaiQIi rilr.x3 expo to be held Frc-st'a Health and Fitness will LhcIJ a free fitness exoo on Saturday. I. Ju'y 12 from 10 a m. to 4 p.m. ' GLicct3 will be able to different &zzzz$ such as kickboxing and f diving, every hour as well as nutiSsnal counseling, body fat testing end massages Owner Marc Larsen v.-;:i elzo offer free injury assessment I during the day. - ! , A free barbecue will begin at .11 f a.m.' -. , r " 1 . . r-reestyte Heann and hitness is locatad at 1255 Iron Horse Drive. For more information, call Larson , or .Rebecca Roberts at (435) 65&-5115. ; Main Street Business Alliance to hold meeting V The next quarterly meeting of the' Main Street Business Alliance will be I held on Tuesday, July 15 at 8:30 a.m. " at the Kimball Art Center. V ChamberBureau I announces annual I ; meeting . I The Park City ChamberBureau i will hold its annual meeting at the Yarrow Resort Hotel , at, nooh1 -on f Wednesday, July 16. The meeting is I open to all ChamberBureau mem- bers and will feature a buffet lunch. , 1 New board members and the new board president will be announced at the meeting and the Chamber will recognize rec-ognize retiring' board members from the previous year. . Myles Rademan will also be the first recipient of a community service award that will be named after him. is- Finally, the Chamber , will also unveil the new marketing campaign for the 2003-2004 fiscal year.. To attend the meeting, members should RSVP to Linda Hilbert at the ChamberBureau by calling (435) 658-6919 or e-mailing lindaparkci- tyinfo.com. The cost for lunch is $15.. r Order of Elks to meet '' The Park City Order of Elks meet i on the second and fourth Thursday of f I each month at the Elks Building on I Main Street. For more information, all (435) 649-9960. , ;. - ', 1 L Watercraft rental available Tha turbochargsd Honda AquaTrax F-12X. Room for three, and room for fun. The world's first production turbocharped personal watercraft And it's filled with features that are pure genius, including a 1235cc marine engine, off-throttle steering system, reverse, a selectable speed limiter, and an electronic keyless ignition system. Summit Honda - Park City 6407 Business Park bop Call 649-RIDE for more information www.sumrnifhonda.com n JcSu (wa row voun yJ ' AND A1WWS WtM A U S COAST OJAK0 APPROVED PtD.. IftOPIicne WIT9U1 BOTTOM. EYWAR AMD OrHtP. iwtSwlt SAfTV APPAWL AlWAYS WHrV -ATTaScO TO YOUR Pf RSON. MEWB fW UNUCR I HE HFUSNCl Of- AtCOHOL OR DRUGS. OttYAU ftDERAL ItatTaNO TlOCAl LAWS AN0 REQULAIIONS. SHOW RESPECT fOR . TKeSmMTANO SH0R8JNE KSOENTS. TAKE A SATCTV COURSE .MM MM M OflO-Sfd-SMJ? Mnknum ntrtunmit $7S V pww H tmtm o( J purelmwl ant AqwTnu and Put Ptrtontww m tnflmww si HomH Mow Co.. LW (03 Markets fill niche for Mexican stores offer food and services unavailable in mainstream stores By MONIKA GUENDNER Of the Record staff Nivea hand cream is gaining in popularity populari-ty in the United States, but customers at American grocery stores need to read English to understand the directions or the attributes on the container. Thousands of residents in Summit County routinely cook authentic Mexican dinners, but Dan's, Smithy Foodtown and others, only offer a limited selection of the beans, spices and peppers that make up the backbone of Mexican cooking. The Census 2000 showed clearly that the immigrant population of Park City and Summit County had grown rapidly in the 1990s and the Hispanic segment leads the way, making up 8.1 percent, or approximately approxi-mately 2,500, of Summit County's total population. pop-ulation. ,. As Park City is slowly waking up to the idea of a growing Spanish-speaking population popula-tion that earns and spends money in the community, some Latino entrepreneurs have found a niche supplying the Hispanic population with specialty products. Park City has become home to two Mexican-owned, Mexican-stocked and Mexican-patronized markets: La Michoacana Market ("The woman from the state of Michoacan") and Anaja's Market. Husband-and-wife team Jose Suarez and Miriam Castillo opened La Michoacana in 1999 after moving to Park City from Mexico four years earlier. It was always their intention inten-tion to start a Mexican market here, said Suarez, who had been a business owner in Mexico. La Michoacana, located on the street level of the Park Record building, has an extended convenience store feel and function. Three aisles in its main section hold the bulk of grocery and household .t.. v.... r. - -.A Kamas Valley business community growing slowly By MONIKA GUENDNER Of the Record staff Monday was a busy day for pharmacist Craig Van TasselL The holiday weekend allowed him some time off from his family business in Kamas, Hi Mountain Drug, but customers weren't waiting any longer after the weekend was over. Van Tassell's store, which also provides toys, school supplies, small appliances and gift items for the residents of Kamas, has graced the townfc Main Street since 1920. Almost half of the floor space is dedicated to a small restaurant with a counter and stools reminiscent of 1950s soda shops, basically unchanged from Van Tassell's memory. His business is typical of several retailers in Kamas for a variety of reasons: Van Tasselft family has owned the drug store since 1968, most of his business depends on local customers, and the business is a permanent perma-nent part of his life, regardless of economic AquaTrax F-12X Recommended only tor operators 16 ytars and older. HONDA I Pure Performance J items as well as cleaning products, refrigerated refriger-ated drinks and a magazine rack. A second room holds a meat counter and a third room offers a deli and a selection of compact discs.' Anaja's Market, located across the street on Bonanza Drive, is the second link in a chain of stores owned by the Anaja family from Salt Lake Valley. Gildardo Anaja is the manager of the Park City location and his goal is to get as many Mexican products ' to the residents of Park City as cheaply as possible. Anaja's kxks more like a modern grocery gro-cery store, although still on the small side by American standards. Shoppers crowd around a meat counter on the day before the holiday weekend and meat is consistently consistent-ly one of the more popular items sold at the store, according to Anaja. From a consumer's point of view, both markets offer a variety of products and Spanish-language labeling that are not available in American grocery stores, some of which stack their limited Mexican foods between the soy sauce and canned fish. "They come because they find more Mexican products in here than in other stores," said Suarez. It's not just the Mexicans coming into the store either, he added. American visitors from states with rich Hispanic influences, such as Texas, Arizona and California, seek out his store to get husks for tamales. Submarino cookies and Mexican brands of '' tea. ' ' According to Suarez, local American customers target two specific items in the market - cheap international phone cards and 3.2-percent beer. Anaja has seen similar results: Americans shop at his market too. as well as Vietnamese and transplants from South America. . The focus in both stores, however, is distinctly dis-tinctly on the Spanish-speaking customer. The handmade signs that label everything from the meat counter to the produce to the policy on writing checks are in Spanish. conditions, weather or growth. Business has been growing in the Kamas Valley, according to Don Kerr of Kamas branch Key Bank, but the pace may seem imperceptible over a short period of a year. Loans can be a measure of growth for a business, said Kerr, but despite the variety of products the bank offers, he has not noticed much change hi the riumber of loan applications applica-tions from year to year. Some of the major changes in Kamas - such as the expansion and relocation of the grocery store - took place more than a year ago. "There just hasnl been any sizeable retail that has come into town in the last year," said Kerr. From his own point of view, Kamas is not lacking any specific business, says Kerr. His own experience has proven to him that small towns such as Kamas provide the best support sup-port for businesses filling basic, daily needs. . Please see Grassroots, A-1 3 4 T 43.000 Square Fmc , 3 Fkxr 15,000 Sf urn? i i growing population Caudido Anaja, above, weighs meat his family. La Michoacana receives below. Both stores cater to Spanish-: Many of the employees at Anaja's cannot . speak English fluently, said Anaja, but he adds that non-Spanish-speaking customers usually know what they want when they come in. Silvia Leavitt works closely with the local Hispanic population and knows Suarez and many of his customers. "This is an important store. When you live in another country, it's nice to find the things to cook with that you are familiar with," she said. "It helps you keep traditions and flavors in your own house." The Mexican teas and boxes of cookies that fill shelves in the little stores reflect the culture. Many countries in Latin America have a similar tradition to the British of having hav-ing a tea hour every afternoon, said Leavitt. The rows of familiar pastries satisfy a sense of nostalgia for ex-patriots and ex-vacationers ex-vacationers alike, she said. Apparently there is enough nostalgia to go around. Suarez does not show concern for the new market across the street. Instead, he says his business has seen a greater effect from national issues. La Michoacana was not shielded by the effects of the terrorist attacks in 2001. said Suarez. Job situations have taken their toll on his customers and he has felt a drop in tourist revenue as well. "I have almost the same customers, but they bought more before Sept. 11 than now." he said. While Anaja's Market is still feeling out its first summer, Suarez at La Michoacana Market knows the money comes with the snow. "Everybody works so everybody has money," Suarez explains. The two stores offer something less tangible tan-gible for Hispanic residents that cannot be .counted in a bottom line, according to Shelley Weiss, with the Mountainlands GRAYSON WESTPARK RECORD Owner Craig Van Tassell, Sarah Leavitt and Melissa Ure staff Hi Mountain. ' M 11 ZJ war V 69,000 Square FmC 3 Floor. 23.000 Sf P 31.000 Square Fc 3 Boon 10.000 SF , jsv r rx PHOTOS BY GRAYSON WESTR4RK RECORD at the new Anaja's Market, owned by another shipment of specialty foods, speaking Park City residents. Community Housing Trust. 'I Tie stores provide pro-vide a community gathering place for Spanish-speaking residents. "They give people a sense of their own country." The markets are an informal way for the Hispanic community to communicate through posters and signs, to raise funds for a charity with donation jars and they offer the community an opportunity to do business busi-ness with someone from their own country, she said. Hie markets also serve as role models. Weiss points out. and may encourage more Hispanics to work for themselves instead of someone else. "Hopefully it's part of a larger trend." she said. Perhaps to push that trend, the Anaja family plans to build more markets throughout through-out Utah. Anaja doesnl speak of denu-graphics denu-graphics or population booms when he describes how the family cluwe Park City for their second store, and with almost all of the employees living in the Salt Lake Valley, there were few family ties. Instead, he says. "We were kxiking for someplace to put a new store. This kmked perfect for us." Creating a large Mexican market in Park City, and a chain of markets in Utah, is only part of Anaja's plans. He would really like to have a store that could carry more and different Mexican products available. "I wish to have a big store, like a Smith's (Food & Drug. Because this," Anaja gestures ges-tures to 'include all of his sales floor, '"is nothing." In the meantime, customers place orders for products they cannot find on the shelves and those orders come frequently. And both buyer and seller make do with what can be brought in. "What we try to do is have a little bit of everything." said Anaja. m -V 1 If J - ... - I Now you can O-f-flCft and Play in one of the fastest growing communities in the United States: Newpark cocporate center v ' Kimball Junction In Summit County, Utah Contact: ., ' : . , -:t Diane Gordon, ccim COLLIERS COMMERCE CRG Gxtf Ctfr. RO. Box 480047. IMHbrA.PiriCK)iUtah640t8 Ml UBtt One. US- 1 5482) Fax . i . wwwcoWorvccr corn |