Shop open at 600 Morro Bay Blvd., Ste. C, since June 2022 offering handmade items
Tucked away on a side street in Downtown Morro Bay, Lazy Goods gift store owner Naomi Holmes is eager to see a good holiday shopping season.
The Australian immigrant has been open at 600 Morro Bay Blvd., Ste. C, since June 2022, offering her handmade jewelry, houseplants, craft items, and more.
When she and a partner opened in 2022, the store was evenly split with exotic plants and Holmes’ jewelry, which she designs and fashions in the store’s workshop area. She’s now added more handmade gift items along with the plants.
The store is located in the newest commercial building Downtown, a mixed-use development with condos on the second floor and several storefronts at street level. It also has an underground parking garage for the residents, a rarity in Morro Bay, and is across Shasta Avenue from the popular Distassio’s Restaurant.
Her store joined a growing number of stores and restaurants that have opened Downtown over the past several years in a sort of mini-boom to the area’s economy.
Along with Lazy Goods, there’s Gaia’s Garden (in the Circle Inn building), Grandma’s Mercantile, Ugly Mug, Red Tail Bikes, Mariposa Exchange, Morro Made, and several other retail places. On the food front, the town lost a couple of places — Kitty’s Kitchen, Grape Leaf Deli, and most recently, Top Dog Coffee, but gained Savory Smoke, Morro Bay Butcher Shop, Scout Coffee, Chowa Bowl, and Morro Deli, who joined long-time eateries The Rock Espresso, Sunshine Café, Pizza Port and of course Foster’s Freeze.
There’s also renewed nightlife with the Siren (replacing the Fuel Dock in the old Happy Jack’s spot), Legend’s Tavern, joined by the newest watering hole, Sammy J’s Irish Pub at 400 Morro Bay Blvd.
“There are lots of new stores,” Holmes pointed out. The variety of these relatively new businesses seem to compliment long-lived stores like Beads by the Bay, Sunshine Health Foods and, Sunshine Café, and Central Coast Music, and mixed all together have made Downtown Morro Bay a lot more interesting place to shop local.
So, while there’s still a hangover from the COVID pandemic and the huge hit the economy took still lingering in town, there is optimism and hope springing up all over, and that’s why Holmes is eager for the days to come.
“People are starting to shop for Christmas now,” she said.
Feature Image: Australian immigrant Naomi Holmes is hoping for a strong local Christmas shopping season for jewelry and gift boutiques and for all the Downtown Morro Bay businesses. Photo by Neil Farrell
