EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) – Over a year after being sold, the Lower Valley staple, Barron’s Superette, has officially been renamed to Valley Supermarket.
The store, which is located off of Acapulco Avenue in the Hacienda Heights area of the Lower Valley, has been home to multiple businesses, including a Big 8. But amongst the building’s multiple iterations, arguably none have been as widely known as Barron’s Superette.
“It was a community grocery store, a true neighborhood store, because we knew all our customers. And like my husband said, ‘We’re like four generations so it was like a big family,'” said co-owner Gloria Barron.
The store was primarily known for its meat market, but also as a mini super-market with multiple departments such as a bakery, tortilleria and a hot deli.
The business belonged to the Barron family for 46 years, from the time Robert Barron Sr. first bought the store in 1976 when it operated as a Mitchell’s, from his then supervisor.
Six years later, his son Robert Barron Jr. and his wife Gloria Barron bought the business from Barron Sr., when he decided to pursue other business ventures.
The couple would oversee the business for the next 40 years with the support of their family: in-laws, children and even grandchildren. They adapted and modernized the store over time. It began as a meat market, and they expanded the building in 2008, after they bought the rights to the land, to include the other departments.
For the Barrons, the success of their business was based on the close relationships they developed with their customers, and the uniqueness of the store.
“What’s the word? Niche. That’s what we created, a niche. So, people, you can’t find just anywhere, they’re going to go there because you have something special to provide to them,” Barron Jr. said. “When you have a relationship with the customer, and you see them every day and that’s what continued to help us.”
The business survived and thrived during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the challenges of the time gave the Barrons a new perspective, and led them to make a big decision.
“We were working seven days a week, bell to bell because of the shortage of employees. And we felt we’d been there 46 years, it was time to continue another chapter in our lives,” said Gloria Barron.
The Barrons sold the business in April of 2022, exactly 40 years after they purchased it from Barron Sr. They allowed the new owners to continue using the Barron name, who just recently rebranded it, but as a sign of the family’s legacy, you can still see the “Barron’s Superette” name on the new pole sign.
With a chapter now closed and a new one beginning, you can still find portions of the Barrons’ legacy.
“I worked for Bobby and Gloria, so I’m the last meat cutter here. There were six of us,” said Valley Supermarket Meat Manager Fernando Gardea, who has worked at the location for 30 years and counting, despite the changing of the guard.
“I feel right at home, like I’m coming home to something very special. Tradition,” Gardea said.
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