Brian Howerton found himself in the grocery business by accident.

It all started more than 30 years ago, when he left a job in the Wyoming oil fields and moved to help his in-laws open a Kenny Rogers Roasters restaurant in the Sooner state. The restaurant never opened, but he found a job working at slinging fish at the butcher block counter at an Albertson’s store in Norman, Oklahoma.

From there, he learned the grocery business from the ground up. Within five years, he was managing a store, moved on to manage others, and worked for other big grocery companies, like Jumbo, and eventually Safeway in Montrose.

“I learned a lot, mostly that I didn’t want to work for them, was the main thing,” he said.

After a stint selling Coca-Cola, he took a job working for Darin Hill, who owned a grocery store in Mountain Village and still owns Mountain Market in Ridgway.

The family lived in Cortez, his daughters went to school in Dolores and he commuted over Lizard Head Pass.

“I went up and down that mountain for 10 years,” he said. “Never missed a day, loved every minute of it.”

After Hill sold the Mountain Village grocery store, Brian became Hill’s operations manager for his 20 grocery stores, stretching from Nevada to Montana. He traveled constantly.

“I was all over the place, except for home again,” he said.

These days, his commute is a lot shorter — he just goes downstairs to the grocery store in Ouray, where he gets to spend time with his daughter, Kaitlyn.

“So this, this is going to pull my family together,” he said. “It’s going to be good.”

The Howertons bought Ouray Grocery in June, and survived their first busy summer season.

Kaitlyn, Kelly and Brian Howerton pose for a photo in front of Ouray Grocery this summer. The Howertons purchased the grocery store in June from Tom and Alyssa Fedel. Courtesy photo

So far, they’ve learned a lot about not only the business but also the community.

Kaitlyn knows some customers will come in every day just to buy a banana and some coffee and visit. She also knows they have to keep Red Bull in stock for the crew working at Maggie’s Restaurant. She even knows some customers prefer a certain type of mustard she can special order.

It wasn’t her plan to stay. She agreed to come out for the summer, and planned to return to a teaching job back in Oklahoma this fall.

Within a week of arriving in Ouray to help her dad with the store, she changed her mind.

“I have to stay,” she said. She not only fell in love with all the employees, but also the town.

“There’s something special about this little mountain town.”

Four months of living in Ouray taught her how tight-knit the community is.

“I’m on a first-name basis with more people here than I did in an entire year of being in Oklahoma, or the five years that I lived in Texas,” she said.

Part of that personal connection comes from the fact that the Howertons are the kind of business owners who do it all. Sometimes you’ll find them unloading the delivery truck and re-stocking shelves. Other times, they’re up at the register, ringing up groceries. You’ll even find them driving the forklift and prepping breakfast sandwiches for the hot case. Customers know they can find Kaitlyn doing the books with her dog, Darcy, in the back.

Brian Howerton lifts a huge pumpkin from a delivery on Monday at Ouray Grocery, whiile his daughter, Kaitlyn, drives the fork lift. The family members do a little bit of everything in owning the grocery store.
Erin McIntyre – Ouray County Plaindealer

Brian knew he would find a friendly, mountain-town culture here, from his years of spending special occasions in Ouray with Kelly and coming up from his grandparents’ farm in Olathe. It feels good to return to such a meaningful place with great memories, including one that happened about 31 years ago.

The Howertons were still living in Casper, Wyoming, and they just found out they were expecting their first daughter. On a trip to Ouray, they stopped into a little shop on Main Street and found a display with baby names on it, and that’s where they picked out Kaitlyn’s name.

Kaitlyn said she finds it incredibly meaningful to help her dad realize his dream of owning his own store.

“I knew what I was getting myself into because I’d worked with him in Mountain Village,” she said. “He’s wanted it for a really long time. So it’s just really cool to be a part of it.”

For Brian, he’s thankful to have his family so involved in the business, since he had to travel so much before and didn’t get as much time with his kids as he wished he could.

“I missed a lot of things, and now I get to spend some of that missing time. So it means a lot,” he said.

Kaitlyn has extensive grocery experience already. She and her sister grew up in the grocery business, helping when they were small to turn cans on the shelves so they faced forward. By the time she was 15, she was running a cash register. She worked summers while she was in college at the grocery in Mountain Village.

Brian calls her “the face” of Ouray Grocery – she has a reputation for loving to visit with customers at the register, though they’re both friendly.

Locals will likely see the rest of the family at the store when they can come to Ouray. Kaitlyn’s sister, McKenzy, is finishing college and completing her degree in radiology at Oklahoma State University. Their mother and Brian’s wife, Kelly, is also still in Oklahoma, working as an education specialist at a job she accepted before they knew the grocery store was for sale. For now, she’ll be back on school breaks and long weekends.

Customers might also notice new items at the store. Brian has plans for ways he can fit more inventory into the small store, to offer more variety. He has already added close to 500 items, but plans on doing more.

“I want them to say, have you seen that little grocery store and everything they have?” he said.

Tom and Alyssa Fedel sold the store to Howerton in June, less than a year after they purchased Ouray Liquors. They invested significantly in the store during their five years of ownership, but decided they wanted to find another owner to take it on for the future. They knew Brian from his time working in Mountain Village and for the Hills’ collection of grocery stores.

“Brian has that institutional knowledge to really take the store to the next level,” Tom said.

The Fedels still come to help unload shipments on Mondays before they open the liquor store.

“They’re just really good people,” said Tom, who was there with Alyssa helping the crew unload the delivery truck on Monday morning. “We wanted to sell to someone who was passionate not only about the grocery business but also would serve the community.”

“He’s the right guy for the job,” Tom said.