On Retailing

Tuesday, October 17, 2000

Port A store features exotica

Co-owners of Bwana Gems travel to find unusual offerings

While searching for wicker chairs for Bwana Gems import shop in Port Aransas, one of the co-owners found herself with the best seat in the Big House.
   Suzette Freeman, co-owner of Bwana Gems at 403 N. Alister St., had learned that well-made rocking chairs could be found at the state penitentiary.
   "I was going down thinking they meant a store near the penitentiary," she said.
   Instead, she, her husband and four friends were led to the prison shop where the chairs were made.
   "We walked right in with the inmates and they locked the door behind us," Freeman said. "It was a very quick shopping trip."
   Two months later, all eight chairs had been sold.
   Freeman and Susie Schmitt have spent the past year offering items ranging from Mexican tile coasters to a hand-carved entertainment center. Freeman and Schmitt shy away from the usual border fare, journeying to such places as Michoacan in Mexico and Namibia in Africa. They make their selections as their customers do - if they like it, they buy it.
   "We don't just order this stuff. We go down and meet the people who make these things," Freeman said. "We have a story with almost every item in the store."
   Most of the items come from small villages in central Mexico. The merchandise includes mats made of woven grass and an entertainment center featuring a hand-carved leopard and displaying a jungle scene.
   "We try to get the real unusual," Schmitt said.
   Schmitt and Freeman first thought of opening the store after Shannon Spencer, owner of Friends & Company beauty salon, decided to close her shop.
   Schmitt and Freeman had worked at Olsen Elementary School together, Freeman as a teacher and Schmitt as a secretary, and discovered that each enjoyed traveling to Mexico. When they found out that the beauty shop was closing, they decided to open their shop at that location.
   The store opened Nov. 24. The store's name had been chosen years earlier.
   "Bwana" means "mister" in Swahili, and alludes to the 1960s "Tarzan" television series where characters addressed the safari leader as "bwana," Freeman said.
   Her husband, Jim, earned the nickname during the couple's many trips throughout Mexico for the past 12 years. Schmitt said Jim Freeman is now at the wheel for the store trips.
   "We just take off on a road and say 'Where to next, Bwana?' " Schmitt said.
   On Retailing is published every other Tuesday. Ideas may be submitted to: On Retailing, Corpus Christi Caller-Times, P.O. Box 9136, Corpus Christi, Texas 78469; e-mail Michael Hines at hinesm@caller.com; fax items to (361) 886-3732; or call (361) 886-4316.
  

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