New historic shop to offer gifts and local goods
For the last several months, the storefront at 114 E. San Antonio Street has been under an intriguing wrapping of San Marcos newspapers, each telling part of the town’s history. From World War II to Aquarena Springs, these pages have enticed curious passers-by to read the headlines while at the same time pressing their faces to the windows for a glimpse of what’s inside.
On Saturday, the wait is finally over. Janice Hardaway and Kelly Bara will open the doors to The San Market, a San Marcos gift shop that celebrates the distinctive charm and history of our town.
“Our vision for the store as it opens is to offer a carefully-curated collection of items that locals and out-of-town visitors can both enjoy, and that honors the history and special features of San Marcos,” Hardaway said. “We would like this to be a place you could bring an out-oftown guest after stopping by the farmers market, or after work to pick up a special birthday gift for a friend, and a place for folks to shop that care about supporting other local small business owners.”
The effort to support local businesses is what originally brought Hardaway and Bara together as partners. Both worked together on a fundraiser for the Crockett Elementary Parent-Teacher Organization. Bara and her husband, Troy, operate a wholesale business called Mugsby, and she offered to partner with the PTO to make and sell Crockett-themed merchandise.
“We worked together quite a bit on that project, and we realized we worked really well together,” Hardaway said. “I started lamenting the loss of Paper Bear, and Kelly had a secret wish to open a retail store.”
From there, Hardaway and Bara began to plan. Both had visited towns of similar size to San Marcos and enjoyed shopping at gift stores that focused on locally-produced or themed items.
“Even something as simple as a San Marcos t-shirt,” Hardaway said. “I grew up here and moved away for college, and couldn’t really represent my hometown like other people did. So we got the crazy idea to go ahead and make the type of shop we enjoyed visiting in other places, but with a San Marcos focus.”
Soon, Hardaway and Bara found themselves taking this wild seed of their idea into the world, where they began the search for the ideal location to set down roots.
“As many locals know, it is not easy to find reasonable lease space in this town – residential or commercial,” Hardaway said. “So when I came up empty, I thought I would just glance at commercial property for sale, for fun.”
This search turned up the retail space at 114 E. San Antonio. The shop faces the Historic Hays County Courthouse, and as an added bonus, it is located down the block from Hardaway’s husband’s law practice.
“When I saw the photos of the inside of this building, with the exposed brick and limestone walls, tin ceiling and original woodwork storefront windows,
“It all felt very fortuitous.”
– Janice Bowden Hardaway, The San Market I was pretty smitten,” Hardaway said. “Unfortunately, we didn’t have access to the kind of money that can purchase a building on the square.”
Which is how Hardaway’s father, Bernie Bowden, came into the story.
Originally the co-owner of the San-N-Pac convenience stores before starting his own chain, Pac-NSac, Bowden owns several properties around town that Hardaway already manages.
“I threw a Hail Mary and asked if he’d be at all interested in purchasing this building, with a guaranteed tenant waiting to move in.”
Hardaway admitted she didn’t think he would be up for it considering that he had built most of his buildings himself and had never dabbled in historic preservation. But with additional persuasion from her mom, who had been toying with the idea of a gift or plant shop for years, he was on board.
In a turn of events illustrating the connectedness of San Marcos, when they toured the building, they learned that one of the tenants was a former business associate of Bowden’s. They then discovered that the seller’s real estate agent, Natalie Butler-Megerson, was the daughter of Brenda Butler — one of Hardaway’s childhood teachers, whose late husband, Wade Butler, was a well-known local artist who rented studio space from Bowden decades ago.
“It all felt very fortuitous,” Hardaway said.
But what really gave Hardaway goosebumps was that the seller of the building was Shirley Rogers, one of the original aquamaids and daughter of the owner of Aquarena Springs. “As a native San Martian, I remember visiting Aquarena and seeing the Aquamaids, and absolutely love the lore of old San Marcos. So this sort of sealed the deal for me personally.”
Though Hardaway admits she’s not a believer in signs, she told Bara she felt this was building into a ‘meant-to-be’ scenario. “We had to have this building for the store, or this store wasn’t happening. If our offer to buy the building wasn't accepted, then this store just wasn’t in the cards and we’d move on.”
As part of the buying process, Rogers asked Hardaway and Bara to write out a letter of intent describing their purpose for the building.
“I’m told our letter may have touched her so much that she cried,” Hardaway said, and added, with a wink, “Just a little.”
Rogers accepted Bowden’s offer, and they began the process of restoring their 1885 San Antonio Street building. “That’s a whole other (long) story,” Hardaway said.
During this weekend, Hardaway’s and Bara’s journey leads to open doors with The San Market’s grand opening. The shop will feature items from as many local artists and vendors as they could fit onto their shelves.
“We have tried to work with as many local vendors and makers as we can, and are always looking for more,” Hardaway said. “We will have candles and skincare items that are made a couple blocks down Hopkins, and coffee roasted about two miles from my house. We print most of the T-shirts we will offer right here in San Marcos. We have worked for months to source as many items as possible from small businesses locally or within Texas.”
Though Hardaway and Bara are hard at work this week, putting the finishing touches on the business endeavor that is so close to their hearts, they still took a moment to pause and reflect with gratitude on the path that has brought them here.
“We’d like to thank each other, because we wouldn’t have ever done this if we hadn’t met and shared this wild idea,” Hardaway said. “We’ve also had a lot of help from our friends and family — Bernie & Carol Bowden, Jon Rholes, Troy Bara, David Hardaway, Patty Duhon, Christine Bowden, Bobby Williams, all of the experts who helped us restore this building to its 1885 glory and an assortment of friends who popped in to help us pull this together or have shared their excitement about the store opening with others. And Shirley Rogers,” she added, “for trusting us with this historic property in such a great location.”
To enjoy the visual retelling of The San Market’s journey, visit the shop’s Instagram at instagram. com/thesanmarket or visit the website at thesanmarket. com. Of particular interest, click the link for Our Story and follow to 1885 section, where the site lists all of the building’s incarnations all the way back to the year it was built.
Or simply stop by and say “Howdy” as the website’s landing page suggests. The San Market’s store hours are 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday and 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday through Friday.
