LAWA’I — For the first time in over 30 years, Don Cope has nothing at all to do with the restaurant business. And, when he looks back at the headaches of food service, at times he doesn’t miss the profession
LAWA’I — For the first time in over 30 years, Don Cope has nothing at all to
do with the restaurant business.
And, when he looks back at the headaches
of food service, at times he doesn’t miss the profession that gave him pocket
change when he was in high school, and helped him work his way through
college.
With the closing recently of Mustard’s Last Stand after nearly 15
years in business at the Hawaiian Trading Post at the intersection of Koloa
Road and Kaumuali’i Highway here, Cope can concentrate on another business
owned by his wife Liz Coleman-Cope and mother-in-law Akiko Coleman: A booth at
Spouting Horn.
Mustard’s Last Stand opened in 1985, and after providing
many a first job to Kaua’i youngsters now college graduates and parents
themselves, it just was time to close the shutters on the kiosk for a final
time, he said.
“I thought it was a real fun icon,” he said of the tiny
pavilion set in the middle of the parking lot of the Trading Post.
After
negotiating with the state Department of Health over the size of windows at the
Stand’s trademark condiment bar for several years, Cope decided he had had
enough.
“It was just time,” he said of the closing of Mustard’s, which will
remain as a haven for vending machines for the time being. Cope said he may
eventually open a shave-ice business in the hut at a later date.
He wanted
to take the opportunity to thank the Stand’s many repeat customers. Countless
others held birthday parties at the facility. The commercial use of the area
where both Mustard’s and the Trading Post are located is grandfathered. The
existing zoning is residential, he continued.
The L.A.L.A. Corporation owns
the Trading Post and the lease on the booth Cope operates at Spouting
Horn.
