It’s not as bad as the Ford and Chevrolet dealers leaving town, but hundreds of Oak Harbor area residents will dearly miss Kits Camera when its doors are locked in a week or two.

Kits, located in the Safeway shopping center, was where camera bugs went when they wanted a wide selection of equipment, quick service, photo advice or quality printing. Over the years they also developed many thousands of rolls of film, but the digital age put a lid on that part of the business. Still, they kept developing film for those who refused to give in to the digital future. There’s nothing like being limited to 24 frames of film to improve a photographer’s self-selection process. With digital, people tend to shoot everything and end up with hundreds of images of a kid’s birthday party. Trust us, it was better when there were only 24 pictures, one or two of which may actually have been decent photographs.

Kits also had a trained staff, led for nearly 20 years by Philomena O’Rourke who would give advice on how to improve one’s photography, how to get the most out of one’s camera, and her crew would always come through with their one-hour film processing promise. They never let down this newspaper, which was a satisfied customer for years.

True, Kits was part of a chain, rather than a locally owned mom and pop camera shop, but it was operated in such a way that the ownership was never an issue. The faces and service stayed the same through the years and trust was developed between the employees and customers. It wasn’t the Oak Harbor Kits store that failed, it was the larger company called Ritz Camera. It was one of those heartless “corporate decisions” that catch everyone by surprise and upend the lives of employees who have given their best to the company for years or decades.

Of course, there’s still Walmart, which will send film out for developing and has machines that allow customers to make digital prints on the spot. It’s a bit cheaper than Kits was, but the quality, service and selection just aren’t the same.

Oak Harbor just lost another friendly, locally operated business providing an excellent service that the people wanted, all because of a corporate decision. It’s more bad news for a local economy that didn’t need any more bad news.