Bringing Public Company Discipline To Longtime Family-Owned Business

In 1985, the Gonzalez family opened a small market in Van Nuys, California, called Carnicería Vallarta. The family focused on selling traditional cuts of meats popular in their native Mexico. They worked hard to build a name for themselves by offering high-quality authentic products, providing a high level of customer service and treating employees as an extension of the family.

Those priorities remain at the core of today’s Vallarta Supermarkets, though there are major changes afoot as the grocer completes its 40th year in business with nearly 65 stores in California.

The Shelby Report of the West joins in celebrating Vallarta Supermarkets for both its 40th anniversary and being named West Retailer of the Year for 2025.

When Howard Kaminsky joined Vallarta Supermarkets as CFO in 2014, he brought something the growing Hispanic grocer had never had – the disciplined financial rigor of a public company veteran.

After nearly 30 years at Sport Chalet – where he helped grow the sporting goods retailer from six stores to 55 and navigated an IPO in 1992 – Kaminsky thought he was headed for what he calls “a cakewalk kind of job” at Vallarta. The reality proved far different and far more exciting.

“The one thing I can tell you about grocery is everything moves really fast, and it’s pretty much the complete opposite of sporting goods. In sporting goods you’re committing to buy product a year in advance, because everything is made to order and imported. Here, it’s gone in two weeks,” Kaminsky said. “Everything is go, go, go.”

That pace – combined with the company’s multi-corporation structure reflecting how the Gonzalez family grew the business – meant Kaminsky had to adjust quickly. But 11 years later, he’s found the rapid-fire environment suits him.

“There are different priorities and, in the end, it’s a lot more fun,” he said. “Everything keeps moving; challenges are non-stop.”

While Kaminsky visited stores frequently in his early years at Vallarta, he now relies on his extensive retail experience and regular shopping trips to stay connected to store operations. When the company does something new, however, he makes sure to see it firsthand.

Kaminsky replaced Vallarta’s retiring CFO through a fortuitous connection: both Sport Chalet and Vallarta shared the same auditor, Moss Adams. When the company buying Sport Chalet didn’t ask Kaminsky to come along, a partner at the accounting firm suggested he talk to Vallarta.

The timing couldn’t have been better. Sport Chalet had survived six difficult years following the recession and the rise of Amazon, ultimately going bankrupt in 2016, two years after Kaminsky left.

Meanwhile, Vallarta offered something Sport Chalet couldn’t: a 15-mile commute from his longtime home in Santa Clarita instead of the 30-mile drive to La Cañada. The company has since moved its headquarters to Santa Clarita, putting Kaminsky just 10 minutes from the office.

More importantly, Vallarta needed what Kaminsky could provide. From his public company experience, he knew about “quarterly reporting, board of directors, lawyers, all of those fun things,” he said. “I brought a lot of discipline, starting with the accounting department.”

Before earning his CPA at Ernst & Young (then Ernst & Whinney), where he worked for seven years after graduating from Cal State Northridge, Kaminsky learned the fundamentals of public company financial management. Those skills became critical at Vallarta, where he immediately tackled what he saw as the most pressing issue – outdated technology.

That was “impacting way too many things for me to feel comfortable,” Kaminsky said. “One of the things about being a CFO is you think all the time about what can go wrong, and with the state of our technology, everything could have gone wrong.”

Making security a priority

Kaminsky’s concerns about IT vulnerability weren’t theoretical; a fellow Southern California grocer literally had been shut down by a ransomware attack one holiday season.

“We took it seriously,” Kaminsky said. “From that moment on, we brought in consultants to talk about what we needed to do.”

Today, Vallarta employs a full-time IT security specialist and has invested heavily in monitoring software that watches the system 24/7. The security officer receives alerts about any unusual activity. The company also runs continuous phishing training for all employees.

“I’ll get an email every two or three weeks that looks funny,” Kaminsky explained.

“If I click the little phishing button, I get a little thing that pops up and says, ‘Hey, you pass the test.’ We try to train everybody on that; it’s a big deal, for sure.”

The investment reflects a broader philosophy Kaminsky has brought to Vallarta: anticipating problems before they occur and building the infrastructure to prevent them.

Preparing for growth

That forward-thinking approach has become even more critical as Vallarta enters an aggressive expansion phase. The company is planning to open eight to 10 stores in 2026, including its first location outside California – a Glendale, Arizona, store opening in January.

The growth will necessitate some outside funding, which Kaminsky has dealt with in his past roles.

“We are not borrowing in any significant way yet, but we certainly will be, so we have to think about how covenants are calculated and make good decisions that don’t cause us any problems. We’ll be doing more planning, more forecasting.”

Working with the founding family

What makes the challenges manageable, Kaminsky said, is working for the Gonzalez family.

“They’re very caring and conscientious about how we do things, why we do things. They have amazing knowledge, having literally all grown up in this business,” he said.

“They really understand Hispanic culture, and they understand the need to evolve, which is very important. I just have to be the watchdog and make sure they’re staying in the lane.”

The family’s business acumen runs deep, though, he pointed out.

“They’re successful for a reason,” Kaminsky said. “They can tell you all about tomatoes, and they can tell you all about borrowing money and paying down loans and buying property. Highly intelligent people, and it runs in their DNA – all of them.”

Kaminsky meets weekly with the executive team, including COO David Hinojosa and members of the Gonzalez family. But his influence extends well beyond those formal meetings.

“My door is open. I answer questions all the time, and probably the toughest part for me is to have enough time for everybody that wants to come and talk,” he said.

Those questions cover everything from marketing contracts to revenue opportunities from customer data. As Vallarta becomes more sophisticated in its operations, Kaminsky increasingly finds himself reviewing contracts and advising on legal obligations – serving as de facto in-house counsel in addition to his CFO duties, since the company doesn’t have a legal department.

Balancing tradition with visibility

One of the more interesting dynamics Kaminsky has observed is the company’s emergence from decades of operating below the radar.

Under Hinojosa’s leadership, Vallarta has become more visible in the industry.

“You can only stay under the radar so long when you’re growing,” he said. “David is a great person. His timing coming to this company was right on … I call it just the Gonzalezes, the way they work. They know when they need something, and they get it.”

As for Vallarta’s future, Kaminsky sees nothing but opportunity.

“It is very bright,” he said. “We’ve got a great team here, a great knowledge base. California is not an easy place to do business, so we don’t have to try to cross that bridge [in new markets]. We’re going to go from harder to easier, hopefully. I think it all looks great.”

Kaminsky will continue his focus on ensuring Vallarta has the financial discipline and infrastructure to support its ambitious growth plans while maintaining the family values and culture that have made the company successful for 40 years.