Capitalism

Mission Beach Cafe Not Paying Their Employees?

Days after the neighborhood was rocked by news that Mission Beach Cafe's compostable forks have tendency to break, we couldn't help but notice reports that they had shut down “until further notice.”  Oddly, their pastry case was full and presumably safe for affluent human consumption, and it seems really unlikely that anyone would close a restaurant on account of defective greenwave.

So what was really behind the closure?  They told Eater that it was because of a “gas leak”, which strikes us as made up, given the lack of Twitter freak-out and the fact they couldn't pin down a reopening date.  And there are two neighbors claiming on Twitter that the staff “walked out” because “they didn't get paid.”

It's curious that a popular restaurant with near-constant lines out the door and $15 huevos rancheros on the menu would be struggling to pay their kitchen staff (or, worse, deliberately not doing so).  Then again, it's all a rumor.

For now, they're back open—their gas leak is 'fixed'.  We'll update if we hear more.

[Photo by dvtdl?]

The Bold Italic Criticizes SF's Homogenization, Doesn't Criticize Itself

It's already Wednesday and we're only now reading our first anti-gentrification rant of the week.  Real evidence the local media is slipping, honestly.  And while we're still not seeing much of a fresh take on things, today's soapbox is a startling one: The Bold Italic.  The Bold Italic.

I cry:

Take a walk down Valencia Street today and you’ll find yourself waiting in line at a Disneyland of pop-culture opulence. Oblivious of the stark irony, graphic designers and marketing managers frequent $50/seat old-time barbershops and shop at retail boutiques obsessed with the rugged appeal of working-class fashion. Simultaneously, the actual businesses and experiences the proprietors are emulating are unable to compete in the increased rental market. What we’re left with are stage props and costumes in an increasingly detached culture of disingenuous, blue-collar nostalgia. […]

Sadly, the very diversity that attracts people to this city is now being threatened by the people it attracts. What we are now witnessing is the rubber band of white flight snapping, bringing with it the strip-mall formula of familiarity that most people who now call this home fled from. It doesn’t matter if it's Whole Foods, Blue Bottle, or a flock of mobile food trucks, gentrification in 2013 seems to be characterized by a stark cultural homogeneity that is leaving one neighborhood indistinguishable from the next.

Oblivious of the stark irony, The Bold Italic published this without taking even the slightest bit of look inward.  No mention of their puff pieces on $50/seat old-time barbershops (published two days ago) or overpriced shaving kits.  No hint at self-awareness of their blind promotion of non-union union-chic boutiques obsessed with the rugged appeal of working-class fashion. Not even a self-deprecating quip about their faux-folksy reclaimed wood headquarters paid for by their deep-pocketed parent's (Gannett, owner of USA Today) generously provided trust-fund (yearly tax write-off).

Yes, The Bold Italic, homogeneity is absolutely ruining San Francisco.

(Also, can someone point me in the direction of our neighborhood Hot Topic? I need some new shirts.)

JELL-O's Pity Pudding Promotion Plays Out Poorly

SF Weekly was on the scene to see how the second place Super Bowl promotion played out:

The plan to unload large amounts of free food, often in San Francisco's grittier neighborhoods, went about how you'd think it would. A JELL-O commercial became an impromptu dispensary on Ninth and Market, as men and women in worn hoodies and grimy jeans groped with both arms into the pudding vat, carting off mass quantities of the ersatz dessert. “You're just supposed to take one!” snarled a pudding worker to a sunken-eyed woman smoking a cigarette down to the butt and loping away with a dozen pudding cups. JELL-O's smarmy tagline leading into their Loser Pudding giveaway was “nothing masks the bitter taste of defeat like the sweet taste of JELL-O Pudding!” Many of the folks helping themselves to armfuls of pudding apparently required extra large masks following strings of defeats a bit more consequential than losing some football game.

The workers regulating the flow of JELL-O to San Francisco's downtrodden population were polite and professional. But this was a rough gig. “I'd rather have a Vince Lombardi trophy, too,” admitted one. 

Read on.

Mission Rental Market Stabilizing, Says JPGs With Numbers on Them

All the anecdotal reports I've heard say the rental market is as savage as ever, but according to some fancy craigslist numbers crunched by the folks over at Mission Local, things are starting to normalize.  After apartment availability bottomed out in August of 2011, the available units have since increased by at least a couple.  And—for even better news—rental rates have just started to even out, with 4+ bedroom places averaging around $5,750 for the last few months and the price of studios actually starting to decrease.

Of course, this doesn't factor in square footage or apartment quality or location or sublets or any of that gobbledygook, but progress is progress.

[Mission Local]

Did Mark Zuckerberg Pay $10 Million to Move to the Mission?

When news broke in mid-October that Facebook founder and one-time MDMA user Mark Zuckerberg moved to the Mission District, it stirred quite a bit of debate as to where exactly he moved and what it meant for the neighborhood.  Over the weekend, The Wall Street Journal seemed to unknowingly figure it all out:

A 5,542-square-foot home in San Francisco’s Mission District has sold for $9,999,000, according to public records.  The price could be a record for the increasingly trendy neighborhood, based on a search of the San Francisco Multiple Listing Service’s records for the last 30 years.

The price is breaking new ground,” says real estate agent Dennis Otto of Pacific Union International, who was not involved in the deal.  “It speaks to the desirability of the location.” The location in recent years has gone from being the grittier side of San Francisco to one that is now a favorite with the young tech crowd, as it offers easy access to the freeway connecting the city and Silicon Valley as well as to an ever growing number of artisanal chocolate shops and hipster coffee outlets.

The article doesn't mention the address or Zuckerberg, but does say it was purchased by SFRP LLC. from Cary S. Collins.  Through some rather trivial Googling, it would appear the house is 3450 21st Street (at Dolores), which was originally purchased for $1.2m in 1997 and only estimated to be worth $3.2m by Zillow, meaning the holding company—registered by a lawyer who specializes in forming trusts for rich folks—overpaid by nearly $6.8m for the privilege of quick access to artisanal chocolate.

All this info matches up with the info dropped by SocketSite over the fall, with the exception of a half-block discrepancy in their reported address:

While Zuckerberg does appear to have bought a home in San Francisco, according to a plugged-in source and due diligence, the house in question is actually atop Liberty Hill on the non-Mission side of Dolores. The property was never openly listed for sale, for which Zuckerberg paid a premium, and Zuckerberg's name is not attached to the house.

Okay, so what if was him?  After all, $10 million is nothing to the kid—especially considering he paid double that to shut down complaints about privacy “concerns.”  However, it's less about the man himself and more the trend it signals.  As Curbed put it:

The Mission has already made news for asserting itself as the latest hot 'nabe. It's a bit of a Cinderella story: What was once a lowly stepchild, cowering in the shadow of real estate giants Noe and Castro, has emerged…and suitors are lining up. Earlier this year Redfin predicted the Mission would be among Bay Area locations to witness the steepest home price increases in 2013. […] With “easy access to the freeway connecting the city and Silicon Valley,” plus SF's local tech corporations setting up shop nearby and the full gamut of new shops and eateries (who could forget “gourmet gulch?”), the Mission is officially the hottest neighborhood for residential real estate.

Better lock in those rent-controlled apartments, folks.  It's going to be a brutal year.

Update: A couple of commenters and email tipsters put Zuckerberg safely in Noe/Castro at 3660 21st Street—not the $10M property originally mentioned, but a couple blocks west.  This property was sold for $3M in May (only $1.2M over the asking price) and registered to a Palo Alto lawyer who specializes in aiding corporate execs with estate planning, so all that matches up.

Should this update prove to be true, it makes the record-breaking $9,999,000 sale all the more curious.  Who the hell else threw a bonus $6.8M at a Mission District address?  Is paying over three times the home's value really what it takes for lowly non-Time's Man Of the Year mega-millionaires to score a crash pad these days?

It seems 21st Street is becoming San Francisco's new billionaire's row.  Anyone want to go halvsies on opening a new artisanal chocolate shop?

Update II: It seems Mark bought both houses, because why the hell not?

[WSJ, via Curbed]

Walmart in the Mission?

Last month, we learned that Fresh & Easy, facing profitability issues, wouldn't be filling the supermarket void Delano's closing left in the Mission.  Reports at the time were light on the details as to who might buy the location, but, according to Monday's Chronicle, speculation is now mounting that Walmart could take over:

“The strategic review of the business has just started; there are no time frames or predetermined outcomes,” said [Fresh & Easy] spokesman Brendan Wonnacott. As of now, “it's business as usual for all our stores” - except for the unopened ones, like the 16,200-square-foot store at the long-vacant Delano's site on South Van Ness Avenue in the Mission.

Tesco has hired New York M&A specialists Greenhill to shop Fresh & Easy assets around, and Walmart, which is looking to open as many as 115 smaller-format “neighborhood markets” nationwide in 2013, has been mentioned as a prime candidate.

“We can't comment on any rumors or speculation, but we're always looking for opportunities to serve customers better,” said Walmart spokeswoman Delia Garcia. “We do think there is a need for affordable fresh food in the Bay Area.”

The report also mentions Berkeley-based Grocery Outlet as being interested.

The idea of Walmart moving into the neighborhood seems impossible, especially given San Francisco's hostile reputation towards such corporations. However, given the relaxed attitude towards megaretailers within the Lee/Newsom administrations, it seems doubtful there would be any downtown opposition towards such a move.

[SFgate]

After 90 Years, Roosevelt Tamale Parlor Goes Upscale

After 90 years of business on 24th, Roosevelt Tamle Parlor has some new owners taking over and giving it an “upscale spin.” Grub Street reports:

Partners Aaron Presbrey and chef Barry Moore (a longtime head chef at Emmy's Spaghetti Shack) took over as of November 1, and they're only beginning to make changes, including a tweak to the official name, which will be The Roosevelt — though the much loved neon Tamale Parlor sign isn't going anywhere. Presbrey tells Grub Street that he and Moore were on the hunt for a restaurant space for several years before settling on this one, so they're now trying to adapt their own ideas to fit them in to the well established restaurant and menu. “We're preserving the rich history that is The Roosevelt Tamale Parlor and enhancing it with some new and interesting things,” he explains.

First off, the existing, 150+-item menu has gotten paired down to the essentials, with tamales still front and center, and your standard Mexican combo plates, etc. And the character of that food won't change too much, though they are trying to use higher quality ingredients than the previous regime.

Read on for some history of the place, what they'll be doing with the old foot soldiers in the kitchen, and a preview of what you can expect.

[Grub Street | Photo by Telstar Logistics]

Is it Time to Ban New Restaurants From Opening on Valencia?

Photo: Maren Caruso/Modern Luxury

Walking down Valencia Street, it's hard not to notice the radical change that the corridor has undergone in the last two years: hours long waits for “Marina Girl Salads” at Tacolicious, tables full of wine-sippers on the sidewalk outside of Farina Pizza and Mission Cheese, that weird techno lounge that apparently serves Indian food next to Luna Park…and that's just to name a few.  Sixteen new restaurants have opened between 16th and 19th street in the last 18 months, reportedly adding “nearly 1,000 new restaurant seats on these three blocks alone.”

“Overall, it's good for consumers. It reminds me a little of North Beach in the '80s, with all these restaurants popping up at different price points,” Slanted Door and Wo Hing General Store's Charles Phan told the Chronicle last month. “It's a good vibe here. To me, it makes it more San Francisco than a lot of neighborhoods.”

But many don't want to see the Mission become North Beach 2.0—a neighborhood exclusively defined by its former glory and largely dismissed by Mission residents, who understandably want nothing to do with a mainstream tourist trap.

“Valencia needs to be a cohesive neighborhood for people who live in it,” Deena Davenport, proprietress of Glama-Rama Salon & Gallery and President of the Valencia Corridor Merchants Association (VCMA), told us over the phone. “We have no florist, no hardware store, no large grocery store.”

“Restaurants are taking over so rapidly, it's as much as tripling rents lately and creating daytime dead zones that are uninviting to shoppers.”

The Merchants Association has become so alarmed by the changes that they added a line to their mission statement specifically addressing the problem: “We endeavor to combine our voices and views toward the goal of maintaining the unique identity and independent spirit of the neighborhood.”

“It's not change that we're against. I think that we all get that change is inevitable.  And that while sometimes uncomfortable, it's not always bad,” explains Jefferson McCarley, General Manager of Mission Bicycle and VCMA board member. “But there are a variety of concerns with so many high-end dinner-only restaurants opening up at such a high rate.”

He breaks down their concerns for us:

  • The impact it has on our rents.
  • The impact it has on foot traffic during the day when these restaurants are only open at night.
  • The impact that valet parking has on the safety of our cyclists.
  • The impact it has on where we can get an affordable meal as locals.
  • The lack of variety of businesses in the hood. (We want a hardware store!)
  • The impact it has on traffic and parking (the patrons of the businesses are almost always driving in from other parts of the city or from other cities).
  • The impact it has on the spirit and vibe of the street.

At a point, it sounds like retailers rebelling against restaurants, but that's not the case.  Some restauranteurs and cafe owners hope to prevent a similar fate that The Summit had earlier this year, when their landlord tripled their rent and tried to bring a La Boulange Bakery into the space.  This includes the proprietor of 780 Cafe Jose Ramos, who's trying to save his cafe after the same landlord raised rents from $9,000 to $30,000 in hopes to bring a multi-million dollar sports bar to the location.

So what is there to do?

Well, there's doing nothing and letting Valencia become a high-end truck stop for Uber cabs crisscrossing the city, but everyone seems to agree that's a lousy idea.  So that leaves us with two viable options: putting a moratorium on full-service restaurants or setting up a Special Use District along Valencia, requiring any new restaurants to meet community approval before opening.

The Valencia Merchants voted Wednesday to approve a combination of the two ideas: a 1-year temporary moratorium by the Planning Department on any new full-service restaurants (counter-service and cafes are exempt) from opening between 16th and 24th, followed by the Special Use Permitting process for restaurants.  The proposal has already received support from Supervisor Scott Wiener, who will take the proposal to City Hall for a final vote.

It's not perfect, as it burdens prospective new establishments with higher start-up costs (potentially making restaurants even more expensive).  Never mind that it threatens 24th and 20th Streets with hyper-gentrification as would-be Valencia restaurants look for alternative locations for expensive eateries.  But as the legislation is expected to stabilize—if not collapse—rents along Valencia, it strikes us as the right approach for the problem.

(Note: we're told merchants along 24th are considering similar legislation before it's too late, but we were unable to reach anyone to discuss it.)

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