Price Busters is about to tap what the retailer's president, Beth Tom, says is "the best location in the state that was available." Price Busters
opens downtownThe company expects to open
its 10th store Nov. 18 at Hotel
Street and Union MallBy Russ Lynch
rlynch@starbulletin.comThe company expects to open its 10th store on Nov. 18, at the mauka-ewa corner of Hotel Street and Union Mall.
The 8,000-square-foot emporium of everything from candies to housewares will open in the 116 South Hotel location that used to house Hawaiian Hula Bread and an L&L Drive-Inn. Before that it was a sundry store and earlier, a Jack in the Box.
Tom said the shop will employ 28 people, bringing the Price Busters payroll about 270.
She acknowledged downtown Honolulu is a place where most customers are present only five days a week, and mostly only during office hours, but she said that is not a problem and the store will be open weekends as well.
"There are 55,000 people that work downtown. They're all our customers," she said. Demographic studies run for the company show that a large number of the downtown workers already shop in the other Price Busters stores, Tom said.
"It's exciting. It's the artery of downtown," she said. "I think that whole area has so much potential. It's awesome. There's a great customer base."
Just one example, she said, would be offices that need gift grab-bags or decorations for parties and "we have the largest selection of candy in Hawaii."
It doesn't matter to Price Busters that there is no parking and no vehicular access to the store because there is plenty of foot traffic, she said.
The location is right at a major bus stop on Hotel Street, where Leeward and Windward bus riders make connections to Waikiki or Kalihi.
The downtown building's owner, Kenmore Properties, is renovating the two-story building and the outside will have a black-and-yellow checkered color scheme, Tom said.
Tom started a wholesale business in 1991, selling hair accessories and other beauty items. In 1993, she went into retailing with the first Price Busters store in Kaneohe.
"We were there nine years but parking was an issue and we just couldn't live up to our potential," she said. The store was closed last year and Price Busters moved into Windward Mall, where it had run temporary Halloween and Christmas seasonal stores for several years. "We are looking in Windward Mall for a larger space," she said.
Price Busters' ninth store, a 23,000-square-feet outlet in Aiea's Stadium Mall, opened July 27, shortly before Tom was recognized by Retail Merchants of Hawaii as 2002 Retailer of the Year.