Harry's Market to move around corner to Ventura Place

One by one, they’ll be moved: the groceries stacked high along old, narrow aisles; the Disneyland collection of junk (everything from old golf clubs to underwear) dangling from strings tied to the ceiling, and the customers who’ve flocked to Harry’s Market at the corner of Mission Boulevard and West Mission Bay Drive for the last 30 years. Thinking of those people whom he’s fed, befriended, and helped out with loans, Harry Bushling says, “I won’t lose a one.”

Harry will transplant the store contents, minus a few higher priced items, to a new building now taking shape at 750 Ventura Place, just a few steps down the alley from the old store. He says he’s been planning the relocation for about five years. Explanations for the specific motivation for the move vary. While Harry grumbles that he worries about the old building’s earthquake safety, owner Mike Hanna (who also owns the Mission Market), says he wouldn’t give Bushling a new lease. Hanna says the building will continue to stand, although he’s not sure who his next tenants will be. In any case, Harry will begin his move in June and plans to be settled into the new spot by October.

The market’s unique atmosphere, which blends nude collages inside with hundreds of community notices plastered outside, should follow soon thereafter, the 77-year-old grocer promises. “People ask me about that, and I tell ’em, just give me maybe a year and I’ll get back the warmth.”