These Times

There's a tortilla factory just down the street

Kirk Ericson | Apr 10, 20250

Gordon Weeks | SMCJ

Erica Adams, co-owner of Maggie's Market/Jalisco Tortilla Factory.

"I have resided in Shelton since 1976. As a native Mexican and now U.S. citizen, I have made Shelton the home for me and my five children. As an active member with the Hispanic community, I have witnessed an awesome growth in Shelton's Hispanic population. It has always been my dream to open a tortilla factory in Shelton and show members of the community, both Hispanic and non-Hispanic, that the American dream is alive and open to all who are willing to reach for it!" — Maggie Velasco-Lucero, in a quote prominently displayed at Maggie's Market in downtown Shelton.

Erica Adams walked into the Journal's front office last week during a lull in the rain, and when I exited the newsroom for a moment, she was chatting with Karen Hranac, the newspaper's chipper people-greeter. Karen introduced us and we had a nice chat, mostly about the Birkenstocks I noticed she was wearing. They had shiny buckles.

I treat seeing someone wearing Birkenstocks outdoors this time of year as a sign of spring, a sign as sure and welcome as trilliums or the sound of frogs croaking in the mire. Such sights and sounds elevate my mood.

Karen said Erica owns a tortilla factory nearby, so I suggested we go there - I was out of tortillas. After getting the paper out that Wednesday, Karen and I got in the car, drove on Third Street, took a right on West Railroad Avenue, traveled three blocks and arrived at Maggie's Market, just two-tenths of a mile from the Journal.

"Geez, Karen," I said. "We could have walked here."

We entered the one-story building, painted in earth-toned orange and yellow sitting at the corner of Railroad and state Route 3. I walked to the display of packaged tortillas, noticed the product name and said while holding up a tortilla package, "My god. You're these guys?"

Maggie's Market is part of Jalisco Tortilla Factory. Mrs. Ericson, our children and I for years have been eating Jalisco tortillas and chips, which we buy at the little grocery in our neighborhood.

"Jalisco is one of our best-selling local vendors," said Nate, who owns Spud's Produce Market, the grocer 300 steps from my front door in Olympia. "In fact, they're our best-selling vendor, period."

How could I not have known about this place in Shelton, this place three blocks from the Journal? This place whose food has filled space in my house for much of the 21st century? My ignorance taunted me, and as usually happens, I began wondering, again, a hopeless question: What else do I not know that I should know?

I carried that package of tortillas to the counter. Erica's husband Torry - also the store/factory co-owner and, according to Erica, an "everything kind of guy" - told me to wait a second. He returned with a replacement package of tortillas, this one still warm from the tortilla cooling tower in the back of the building. I held it against my cheek to feel the warmth.

I returned to Maggie's two days later to put my ignorance more thoroughly to rest.

Since August 2012, Erica has been running - with co-owners - the tortilla factory started by her mother. Erica and her husband were born and raised in the area, and they have two children, ages 6 and 9. The prime mover of the place, her mother, Maggie Velasco-Lucero, retired in 2011 and remains in Shelton. Her father, Eddie, died in 2021.

"When they started, they were in survival mode," Erica said of her parents. "They learned as they went, just like being a parent. They didn't have a manual on how to run a tortilla factory in Shelton."

Jalisco Tortilla employs about a dozen people, full and part time, and their products are distributed to 50-75 stores and restaurants from Tigard, Oregon, to Seattle, she said. Maggie's Market sells their own products, including salsa, tortillas and chips, and carries food from other area businesses, including eggs from Hungry Hollow Farm near Hartstine Island and bratwurst from Johnson's Smokehouse and Sausage in East Olympia.

It also sells a yogurt from France that might be the best yogurt you'll ever taste, and it will be the best container you've ever eaten yogurt from.

The tortilla machine can produce 11,800 tortillas an hour, Torry said, and they have a separate room in the back where their varieties of salsa are made. You can also just sit in Maggie's Market and have a cup of coffee served in an artful, highly functional mug.

They started work on the market space in April 2020. Before that, it was all factory.

The production-only busyness "became too much," Erica said. "I realized in 2018 or 2019 that we were going through too many workers. I decided I wouldn't make a decision based only on profit and loss ... I wanted to be around people I could be happy around and in a place that had good energy."

Now she has vacationers from around the world stop at the shop while they're heading up or back from the fjord. Erica smiled when she told me that fact.

The market is populated by plants, mostly aloe vera plants that belonged to her father.

And outside along the sidewalk in front of Maggie's Market are a few chairs for customers to ease into on a sunny day, each brightened with a yellow seating pad.

I had noticed the yellow chair pads. I had also noticed that the Jalisco tortillas I bought tasted better than they had before, maybe because I now knew the space and the people those tortillas came from.