Bruce’s Market

The McEachern family claims a heritage that includes four generations of commercial fishermen. Bruce, son of Dan and Minnie McEachern, was born in Saskatchewan to a family of 8 brothers and 2 sisters. The family came west, moving to Langley in the 1930s. Dan and Minnie stayed on the Langley farm until 1974, when they moved over to the other side of the Fraser River and settled in Albion. While father Dan fished both the Fraser River and the Gulf of Georgia, all nine sons were involved in the fishing industry during their working lives. The Albion Ragg in February of 2003 claimed that “each of the boys acquired knowledge of fishing and net mending through ‘apprenticeship’ with their dad. The ‘McEachern Boys’ worked in many areas of the fishing industry in gillnet, long-line, troll and seine fisheries, as well as the transport of fish.”

Bruce and Elnora were married in 1944 and worked together on Bruce’s fishing boat. Though no one was hurt, the boat capsized off Texada Island, and ideas of a store soon followed. They sold the boat for $10,000 and opened the Albion landmark known as Bruce’s Market soon after. The couple had three children — Glenna Murray, Angus McEachern, and Darrel McEachern.

The store was opened on April 2, 1948 by Bruce and Elnora McEachern at the intersection of 240th Street and Lougheed Highway.

Their grand opening sale on Friday and Saturday, April 2nd and 3rd 1948, included some great deals, such as peanut butter for 39 cents, tomatoes for 21 cents, pork and beans for 27 cents, and peach halves for 25 cents. Elnora McEachern recalls how “they were both beautiful days!” according to the Albion Ragg from February 2001.

Bruce noted that simplicity ran the business from the beginning. “No computers, no cash register. Just a book that listed all transactions and relied on trust. You trusted customers that they were going to pay and they trusted you to give them everything they ordered. It was a two-way trust that worked well,” according to a 1998 Times article.

In time, the family expanded it’s business to include a fleet of salmon gillnet boats, a processing plant and their own smokehouses. One of the earliest fishing boats in the McEachern fleet was the “Glennora”, named after Bruce’s wife, Elnora, and his daughter, Glenna. The boat was built in Albion by Finn Don Puska in 1960. State of the art for its time, the boat cost ten thousand dollars to build.

In an April 1998 Maple Ridge Pitt Meadows News article, Bruce recalls how the store has changed over the years: “Things change. Years ago, we didn’t sell eggs or milk. Everyone had their own chickens and cows… Like most other grocery stores of that bygone era, Bruce’s Market also made home deliveries.”

While Bruce and Elnora started the original 1,500 square foot Bruce’s Market, their three children and their spouses operated the new store. The bigger building was opened on April 2, 1996 with 6,000 square feet of retail space, including the market, coffee shop and delicatessen, which “has become a favourite meeting place for local commercial fishermen and customers from as far away as Mission,” according to the 1988 News article.

To this day, the market continues to be owned and operated by the McEachern family.

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