Boom unites North Shore business
By Will Hoover
Advertiser North Shore Writer
Nine months ago, Hale'iwa was an economic wasteland, with businesses closing, few paying customers, and little hope for the future.
Cory Lum • The Honolulu Advertiser
Last week, folks along this northern strip of O'ahu — a rugged and independent lot who seldom concur on much — were in firm agreement on one thing:
The line for shave ice spills out of M. Matsumoto Grocery Store, which has seen sales rebound after the Sept. 11 slump.
"The North Shore is booming," said Nancy Salemi, who owns Cholos Homestyle Mexican restaurant at the North Shore Marketplace. "Anybody who isn't doing well out here now isn't doing anything. This town's busting at the seams."
There are nearly as many theories about the recovery as there are people to ask. But whatever the cause, people here seem determined to make it continue — so much so that they're willing to take a crack at a unified front.
Last Thursday, four dozen business leaders from this world-renowned surfing mecca gathered at Waimea Falls Park to inaugurate the North Shore Marketing Alliance, a collective effort to benefit the 20-mile stretch from Ka'ena Point to Kahuku.
The meeting ended with plans to create a North Shore O'ahu Web site linked to The Hawai'i Visitors Information Bureau site, to develop a visitors information program, and a vow to promote the region as a destination.
"I've got excellent feelings about this. This could be the biggest thing ever to promote the entire North Shore business community," said Robert Speer, executive director of Empower North Shore O'ahu, the three-year-old nonprofit, community-based economic development organization that facilitates the marketing alliance.
What makes this economic brightness so dramatic is the contrast with the gloom and doom of last November, when Terry and Gloria Gerber were calling it the worst business wipeout in memory.
Cory Lum • The Honolulu Advertiser
The culprit was the New York terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, when the tourist economy went into a free fall and local businesses were reporting revenues off by 25 percent or more.
Cars and customers are cruising through the heart of Hale'iwa again after months of quiet.
That month, the Gerbers shut down one of their two businesses in Hale'iwa, the Sunset Hawai'i Clothing Co., and were ready to call it quits on their other operation, the Flavormania Homemade Ice Cream parlor, which Terry had dubbed "Gerber's last stand."
With 2002 came the beginnings of an economic awakening the likes of which the Gerbers could not believe. Today an ecstatic Terry Gerber says 2002 has produced his best showing in seven years.
"The trend is your friend," he said, noting that his business went from minus 25 percent to plus 27 percent in six months. "In the second quarter, we're doing more than 10 percent better than we were doing at the same time a year ago — and that was before Sept. 11."
Other area merchants report similar enthusiasm. Stanley Matsumoto, who operates Matsumoto Shave Ice, one of the area's anchor tour-bus stops, has seen similar increases.
"Business is good," Matsumoto said.
Gerber says he is as encouraged as he's been in years, but he is less optimistic about prospects for the marketing alliance.
"These things have been tried before. But to get all us stubborn people living in our own little worlds to agree on anything is tough — especially up here, where there are so many factions," he said.
Cory Lum • The Honolulu Advertiser
Marketing alliance chairman Kalani Fronda agrees with Gerber. Also president of the Hale'iwa Main Street business association, Fonda says the North Shore traditionally has consisted of individual communities — Kahuku, Sunset Beach, Pupukea, Hale'iwa, Waialua — committed to their own turf.
Steve Ellis, left, and partner and chef Alika Freitas opened Cafe Notte, an Italian restaurant in Hale'iwa in April, despite a North Shore business slump.
To convince these fragmented components that what's good for one is good for all is like "paddling uphill," Fronda said.
"But it can done. This alliance meeting, the recent Sunset on the Beach event up here, and this weekend's Hale'iwa Arts Festival are all examples of different factions of people getting together and making something work," Fronda said.
The key is to market the whole North Shore as a destination, Fronda said. That's the way to continue the economic resurgence started after 9/11 by city revitalization programs such as Ho'olaulea Events, and by individuals and companies that have spent money on marketing the area.
Businessman Steven Ellis, who along with his partner, Nancy Salemi, invested $200,000 to transform a laundromat near Weed Circle into the new Sicilian restaurant Cafe Notte, said he has "put his money where his mouth is."
The pair's faith in Hale'iwa is all the more impressive considering they got the idea before Sept. 11, and opened the restaurant April 1.
They admit they had second thoughts in between. But they concluded the North Shore economy was bound to stage a comeback.
"It wasn't the best time to be planning a new business," admitted Ellis, who co-owns Cholos and said he spends $100,000 a year on advertising, because it's worth it. "But I got a hell of a deal on the building lease."
Area business owners show little consensus on the reasons for the North Shore's economic recovery.
Ellis believes it is the result of a concerted, long-term effort by the tourist industry to promote the area. Gerber thinks it's simply because the airline industry is flying in more people from the Mainland than before Sept. 11. Salemi believes it's a combination of more Mainland tourists, better targeting of local consumers and less emphasis on catering to a diminished number of Japanese visitors.
Matsumoto wonders whether it's because a growing number of people feel safer flying to Hawai'i than to other destinations.
Christine Murdock, marketing director for Empower North Shore O'ahu, disagrees with the idea that North Shore residents cannot reach consensus on anything. A month after the terrorist attacks, she noted, community business leaders got together to discuss what could be done to help business.
"The one thing that every business and faction agreed on, from the biggest to the smallest, was that the North Shore has no marketing plan," Murdock said.
From that meeting, the idea of the North Shore Marketing Alliance was born, Murdock said. Community agreement led to a clearly defined direction by which North Shore might continue to let the good times roll.
