It’s with a sad heart that I am sharing the news that effective immediately Con’s Pit Stop is closed.

Since we are heading into the holidays in an already challenging year, we will be paying staff a generous bonus based equal to about two months worth of employment.

Maia and I purchased the building 274 A Street in the spring of 2024. The goal of purchasing that building was to create space for the Peach Pit, a teen cafe upstairs, and have the businesses below provide revenue to help support the building and the youth.

At the time, there were three active businesses, the Farm to Ferry Food truck, Eastsound Sporting Goods, and Con’s Pit Stop. While the food truck and sporting good stores were renters, the Con’s Pit Stop business was included with the sale of the building.

And so we found ourselves owning and operating a convenience store.

Naturally, a lot of mistakes were made on our part. We’ve never owned a retail business, and  we were very distracted owners – with Maia focused on the Peach Pit and me on other various community initiatives. Inexperience and inattentiveness are never a good recipe and the results were that we’ve lost money every month.

We greatly appreciate the managers and staff who worked so hard to make Con’s a place the island can be proud of. 

We believe that Con’s has filled a valuable need as one of the few businesses left dedicated to serving full time islanders and I am sad that we couldn’t make it work.

With that said, we will be considering proposals for someone to take over the business.

As there has already been multiple people expressing interest, our priorities in decision making will be:

• Owner Operator or Co-Op
• Staff compensation plan
• Vision that lines up with needs of full time islanders
• Relationships with the Latino community
• Ability to contribute profit / rent to the Peach Pit
• References and reputation

We will be flexible to help with the terms and the transition for the right people. 

Thank you,

John Vechey

Ps: If anyone has any questions or has a proposal for taking over the business, please email in Spanish or English: john@conspitstop.com with an overview of your vision and speaking to the above mentioned priorities.