Luke & Lisa Horgan

Luke and Lisa Horgan met over an argument about ramen noodles. Both were serving overseas in the US Air Force and they found each other sharing the stove cooking the same brand of noodles. The mutual respect for noodle choice quickly gave way to a disagreement about cooking methods and a lifelong love was born. She was originally from Ireland and grew up on US military bases in Germany. He was born and raised in Manhattan, but went to high school in San Antonio, Texas.

Upon their honorable discharge from the military, they moved to New York and started careers in finance and media. Luke worked for Bear Stearns, HSBC and HBO and Lisa worked for Alliance Bernstein and Conde Nast. His focus was data and technology, and she managed complex digital products and projects. They lived the life of a New York power couple for a few years, but something always felt missing. There had to be more to life than the hustle and bustle of the big city. They decided to move back to San Antonio seeking a balance that had previously been missing. They found jobs at USAA and worked there for a few years but still... there had to be more. Some time around 2018, they came to the decision that it was time to pursue their entrepreneurial dreams and they began discussing small business ideas and the possibility of leaving the corporate world behind. A year later, they bought the tiny corner store in his old high school neighborhood and tried to turn it into something special.

Many years earlier, when Luke first left New York as a rebellious teenager, he expected to struggle in Texas. Instead, he found life-long friends, a welcoming new family and some of the best memories of his life. Honoring this love, appreciation and acceptance would be the goal of their corner store. How could they best honor the neighborhood that welcomed him so warmly many years ago? With this in mind, they opened San Antonio’s first Bodega and named it after the neighborhood. Jefferson Bodega opened their doors in 2019 and has been serving the local community ever since. Ramen is up front and occupies the first big shelf in the store. And the argument about the best way to cook and serve it continues to this day.

Jefferson Bodega

Jefferson Bodega is a tiny convenience store that specializes in weird, hard to find, and limited edition snacks, drinks and craft beers. We didn’t plan on being San Antonio’s premier destination for cool snacks; that happened because we failed. Big Time.

You see, the Bodega opened in November 2019 just before Covid struck. We had just poured our entire life savings into buying the old corner store in his high school neighborhood. But almost immediately no one wanted to talk about ice cream or gummy bears because they were desperate instead to find milk, eggs and toilet paper. So, we got creative and started reaching out to companies local and all around the world to find ways to get the people what they needed. We built direct-to-farm relationships with local farmers, developed international toilet paper sources, and even became an official government distribution center for the Farmers to Families food box program handing out over 2,000 boxes of food during the pandemic! Due to our new international relationships, we were also the only place in town to not run out of toilet paper, so we shared it with our neighbor businesses that stayed open in order to help their businesses survive or even thrive during the worst. Unfortunately, all the giving away and helping the neighborhood meant we had very little left in the bank or inventory. And as the pandemic lifted, we were left with international vendor relationships, but no longer a need for the essentials we’d previously ordered. Out of options and out of budget, we asked our partners, “what else have you got?” and a few responded with international drinks and snacks like Japanese Kit Kats. We could only afford a few of these, but they sounded so interesting. So we gave it a try, and during the next, stay-at-home phase of the pandemic, we became the go-to spot for fun “quarantine snacks”. Where first we brought safety to families, now we brought joy!

Since then, we’ve evolved even further to become a hub for local artists, pop up small business and start up food stalls through our wide range of weekend events. You never know what you’ll find at the Bodega; it could be the coolest snack you’ve never heard of, there could be a music video shoot, or it could be the day the symphony plays a free concert here. Or perhaps, it’s our child-entrepreneur pop up market. One thing is for sure, our mission remains the same as it did during the worst of times, to bring a little bit of happiness and joy to everyone that walks through the door.