• Kapa‘a Aveda Spa closes
• Kekahu Foundation Board of Directors election results
• New book highlights Hawai’i’s small family businesses
Kapa‘a Aveda Spa closes
The Aveda Spa formally located at the Waipouli Beach Resort & Spa is officially closed for business. “We regret to inform you that we’ve closed out doors as of Nov.. 25,” the voice message recording says. “We appreciate your patronage and we’ve enjoyed being of service to you.”
The Princeville Health Club & Spa is also reportedly set to undergo renovations sometime this month and sources say it will be closed for six to eight months. Attempts to contact the spa for comment were unsuccessful.
Kekahu Foundation Board of Directors election results
The Kekahu Foundation, the non-profit organization responsible for Kaua‘i’s community radio station, KKCR, announced the results of its second annual election for a seat on the Foundation’s Board of Directors in a press release last week. The election was significant in that it marked the second time since KKCR went on the air in 1997 that members of the Kekahu Foundation have had a direct say in determining who sits on the Kekahu Foundation’s Board.
Three candidates filed applications to participate in the election, which was conducted from the start of October until November 10. The results of the election, in which 19 percent of the members voted, were accepted by the Kekahu Foundation Board at its Nov. 16 meeting.
New book highlights Hawai’i’s small family businesses
For 23 years, until Aloha Airlines closed in 2008, cultural treasures and small family businesses were the focus of Jocelyn Fujii’s columns in Spirit of Aloha, the airline’s inflight magazine. Fujii, a native of Kaua’i, wrote about Lawai International Center, Anna Sloggett, Bob Hamada, Pono Market, Taro Ko Chips, Tip Top Motel, Café and Bakery, Miura Store (now Déjà Vu stores), Kaua’i Fruit & Flowers, Hamura Saimin, and many more of the beloved Kaua’i signatures that make Hawai’i special. Finally these articles, edited and with updates, are available in book form, in a new release titled “Stories of Aloha: Homegrown Treasures of Hawai’i.”
The stories on Anna Sloggett , Pono Market and Tip Top are among the more than 140 articles, essays, and recipes in this 264-page tribute to the cultural treasures and small family businesses of Hawai’i. While the book is sold in Barnes & Noble Ala Moana and other selected stores statewide, the distribution channels, says Fujii, are, like the stories, neighborhood-oriented.
Non-profit groups like Lawai International Center and the Qi Center on Kaua’i, as well as Prayer Rock Foundation on Maui and the Daughters of Hawai’i (which runs the Queen Emma Summer Palace on O’ahu and Hulihe’e Palace on Hawai’i island), are selling and distributing the book as fundraisers for their organizations. Museum shops, such as the Kaua’i Museum gift shop, and specialty shops, like Kong Lung Center, are also carrying the book. But it won’t be found in conventional bookstores other than Barnes & Noble, which automatically allocates part of the proceeds from book sales to the Lokahi for Aloha fund for former Aloha Airlines employees. On Kaua’i, small businesses, such as Tip Top, Sueoka Store, Hairmates, HS Ferreira Hair, Kaua’i Island Finance, Pho Vy Restaurant, and Ocean Front Realty — none of them in the retail book market — are carrying the book in support of Lawai and the Qi Center. The Déjà Vu shops, formerly Miura Store, are carrying Stories of Aloha as the first book to appear among its surf, swimming and beach gear.
Businesses and cultural figures on the other islands include Sig Zane Designs, Rainbow Drive-In, Helena’s Hawaiian Food, Big Island Candies, Nii Nursery, Honolulu Broom Company, Mid-Nite Inn, Seaside Restaurant, Pono Market, and more than a hundred others. The late Kenichi Tasaka of Hanalei, at the time of the interview (1988) 91 years old, is prominently featured in the Kaua’i chapter.
Celebrated actor Richard Chamberlain wrote the foreword, and the photographs are by veteran photographer Brett Uprichard, who has worked as editor, writer and photographer at Honolulu Publishing Company since 1979. Honolulu Publishing Company was the publisher of Spirit of Aloha magazine from January 1978 until 2008.
Tucked into each book is a complimentary full-color copy of a vintage Aloha Airlines route map from pre-statehood Hawai’i, circa late 1950s.
Aloha Air Cargo, whose 400 employees all previously worked for Aloha Airlines, has shipped and distributed complimentary copies of the book to former Aloha employees on all the islands. Aloha employees have contributed recipes for the book, recalling one of Spirit of Aloha’s most popular features, the recipe section.
For more information, call Lynn Muramoto at 808-639-4300.
