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About Brenda & Joy

 

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Kona Stories Owners
Brenda McConnell (Left) and Joy Vogelgesang (Right)

 

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About Brenda: Brenda found her home in paradise in 2005. She was raised in Oregon but spent most of her adult life in Northern California. Brenda is a mother of three children and worked until recently in the medical field and then owned her own childcare business. If Brenda was ever asked what her "dream job" would have been it would have been to own a bookstore. "I just started talking about it like it was real" states Brenda. "I would go to independent bookstores and talk story with the owner and even started taking pictures of things I liked". After several years of planning and dreaming
Kona Stories was a reality opening Thanksgiving Weekend 2006.

 

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About Joy: Joy spent many years toiling in the corporate salt-mines of Honeywell in Phoenix, AZ, Albuquerque NM, Hong Kong, and Minneapolis MN. When she reached the point in her career when she wasn't learning any more, wasn't having much fun, and could afford to quit, SHE DID! Her last job at Honeywell was as Vice President of Human Resources. Joy then moved to the greater Sacramento CA area and began working part-time at Borders. This "fun job" remained so much fun that she moved to full-time and progressed through a variety of jobs at both Borders and then Barnes & Noble over the next 5 years. Then in the summer of 2006 she moved to Hawaii to open Kona Stories.