A local Hawaiian- and Hispanic-inspired gift and snack shop closed its physical location in Taylor’s historic downtown at the end of August.
Owner and founder Chella Cardona-Jackson decided to close Hola Aloha, formerly located at 118 W. Second St., because of what she said is low traffic in the area.
“Nobody was really coming down to the historic area,” she said.
Cardona-Jackson celebrated the space with a happy-hour event on the store’s birthday, Aug. 28, while also using the time to give back to the community. Funds from rainbow rubber ducks and raffle tickets for gift bundles benefited Taylor Pride and Down Home Ranch, an Elgin-based nonprofit farm empowering people with disabilities.
“We know this just means you’re onto your next chapter in successful entrepreneurship, but we sure will miss you (and) all of the goodness you brought to Taylor,” Taylor Pride wrote in an Instagram comment under Hola Aloha’s closing announcement.
Hola Aloha transitioned from a shaved-ice food truck in east Austin to a brickand- mortar gift and snack store in Taylor during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
Cardona-Jackson found herself in Taylor when her friend and owner of local coffee shop Good Strangers, Sarah Fisher, invited Cardona-Jackson to take over a retail space from her.
Fisher had bought the business that operated in the space previously but closed it down to focus on running the coffee shop, which is a neighbor to Hola Aloha.
During this time, Cardona-Jackson lost her mother, and opening and running the store allowed her to work through her grief and form a community, she said.
“What will always be dear to me in having my shop … is what it provided for myself and for all of the others that made their way and found their way to the space,” Cardona-Jackson said. “I met countless people who also lost loved ones, and I feel like that space was just a safe space for them to come and commiserate over their losses.”
As businesses began to open back up and return to full operations in 2022, Cardona-Jackson noticed the store’s sales growth decreased as fewer and fewer visitors came downtown.
“The majority of people that live in Taylor didn’t really come to the area,” she said. “They were never really the bulk of our customer base.”
Her sales relied on tourists visiting the city, but eventually, Cardona-Jackson said she saw a decrease there, too, as other small businesses in the area closed down, which she attributed to rising rents.
“There was a big group of businesses that sort of went out of business … and we kind of felt the effects of that because people were coming in from out of town, and they were realizing that there wasn’t really a whole lot there on offer,” she said.
While Hola Aloha’s physical store is closing, the business will still live on as Cardona-Jackson focuses on catering and — on a wholesale basis — marketing her health-focused Hawaiian- and Hispanic-inspired food products, including marinades, seasonings and sauces such as chamoy and an original taco seasoning, and protein alternatives made of hibiscus, mushroom and cactus.
In addition to Hola Aloha, Cardona-Jackson owns and runs an event-production business called KUL Productions, which helped keep Hola Aloha afloat for the past two years, she said.
With Hola Aloha taking a back seat, Cardona-Jackson looks forward to having some time off.
“After this year, I’m just going to take a break,” she said. “It’ll be nice to have my life back. … I went several years without having a day off.”
