“Rest of” closed businesses story

For those of you who are old enough, here is the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey would say. Last week King 5 News did a piece that aired at 5, 6 and 11 o’clock on their news broadcast about La Conner losing nine businesses due to COVID 19. Their motto “We stand for Truth” certainly did not reflect that in this piece.

They stood in front of Bears and Things as one of the businesses that went out because of COVID 19. That business has been “going out of business” for 10 years and after the owner passed last year, the building was sold. By the way, there is a sign on the door that says “An Exciting New Retail

Experience is Coming in the fall of 2020”.

Cottons, which closed their doors after 30 years, said that they had been thinking of retiring and COVID 19 pushed them to close. A new antique store just opened right next to Country Lady. The Sempre Italiano space at the corner of First and Morris has been leased and a new store is going in there.

Yes, COVID 19 has had a huge impact on our retail businesses, although the “tumble weeds are not rolling down the street” as was said on the King 5 piece. La Conner had 14 stores go out of business during the 2008 downturn and then there were none.

We are a town that reinvents itself time after time and with new fresh blood coming in (perhaps even staying open during the summer past 5 o’clock!) we will rebound and be even Better. Let’s look at the glass as half full rather than half empty!

Hopefully King 5 News will come back and present “the rest of the story!”

Marna Hanneman

Rachel “The Pig’s Mom”

La Conner

(10 businesses have closed or announced their closings. At least four are for sale – ed.)