New marketplace brings local businesses back to Lahaina

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LAHAINA (HawaiiNewsNow) - A new marketplace has opened at the former Outlets of Maui site, bringing local businesses back to Lahaina more than three years after the 2023 wildfires.

The transformed site, now called ʻUlu o Lele, celebrated its grand opening Tuesday.

Kūhiō Lewis of Hawaiian Council said the name reflects both Lahaina’s past and its future.

“Lele is the ancient place that this was once called,” Lewis said.

The marketplace offers space for small local businesses at a site that once catered to large corporations.

“Once catering to large corporate businesses, and now it caters to the small business, and the backbone of Lahaina, the people of Lahaina,” Lewis said.

One of them is Lahaina-native Courtney Lazo, who owns clothing brand Henohea Hawaiʻi.

Lazo runs her shop out of one of these modular units, right down the road from where her childhood home on Wainee Street stood, before it too was destroyed in the fire.

“We’re not back home there physically living but the fact that I have a store now on Wainee Street is pretty significant and it feels just like a full circle moment.”

One door from Lazo, more of Lahaina’s own, Front Street Fresh, a Mexican-inspired food truck owned and operated by Sergio and Brazlee Perez.

The eatery’s owners were forced to move away after losing their home to the 2023 tragedy, and lived in Las Vegas for two years before returning to Lahaina.

“We always planned to come back, and then what better time right now than the ʻUlu o Lele market,” Sergio said. “It’s the best for the community, and we’re stoked to be here; we’re happy to be here.”

“I’m born and raised from Lahaina. I started my family, met my husband here in Lahaina, so coming home, back home here, in this place, in the heart of Lahaina, means everything and the world,” Brazlee said.

Lazo said the marketplace offers an opportunity to imagine a new future for Lahaina.

“In the rebuild, we really get to re-imagine what we want our hometown to look like and we had this unique opporutnity that we never had before, so the fact that this space is filled with local vendors is beautiful,” Lazo said.

Hawaiian Council said it plans to use airport advertising and a shuttle service to inform visitors about the marketplace and encourage them to visit.