You just can't make this shit up... on Second Avenue just south of East Fourth Street... a Red Mango will be opening soon... right next door to a gelato shop...
Red Mango opened and closed on St. Mark's Place a few years back... but apparently the FroYo Force is strong...
19 comments:
come on, everyone knows gelato is *significantly* different than frozen yogurt. sometimes you want gelato, sometimes you want froyo... now both are located right there for your luxury convenience!
NOT TRYING TO ENDORSE froyo, but if you must have it, I feel this chain is probably the best. Wasn't it a printer cartridge store in that space previously?
this is the third Red Dingo downtown as another at 14th and 6th avenue closed in March 2013 - Perhaps they could rename it Red Dildo and open on Christopher St.
cant wait for all those 711 protesters to start protesting this chain...oh wait they probably wont
Obviously the neighborhood is "under served!" ;)
ughs........a gelato is on ave a now.. and 3 tours buses when i got home.. just..ughs........
Fashion by Meh, what exactly are you saying? They should protest the chain? They shouldn't? You'd like to protest the chain but you'd rather let someone else do the work?
'Fashion by He' almost raises the important questions that so far only the community board has: if chain stores had to gain approval at the community board (NO711's goal) on what criteria would the local community board approve or disapprove? For some sites in some neighborhoods, employment might be the priority; others wage scale or employment type; others affordable or quality services to residents; anchoring small landlords-at-risk (as in Chinatown) or co-ops with many seniors (as on Grand Street); and impact on commercial rents. Those are the questions to think about.
Those and the next step: how to incentivize truly local ownership and prevent externally owned small businesses -- a much more difficult challenge since even local owners can't always keep their residential space.
Notice also that if the community board had say on chains, they could negotiate stipulations as they do with bars for their liquor approval. Stipluations could include wage scale, aesthetics, range of merchandise -- just about anything could be put on the table. It would give far-reaching power to the CB, a radical idea, but in my opinion, a necessary one if NYC is not to be given over entirely to corporatocracy.
@rob
"A radical idea" ??
Are you kidding? Radical for OUR community board, maybe. But that's what most other community boards do.
There's a reason why when you hit Bleecker Street in the West Village you don't see any Citibank, Duane-Reade, Subway, Dunkin' Donuts. And it sure the hell isn't because any of those wouldn't puke-up a storefront in a second if they could.
The community says "No", for the good of the community.
@10:07 -- The CB2 (west of Bowery) has no more control over commerce than CB3. CD2 has a bunch of special districts that restrict use. CD3 has no special districts. Now, it may be that landlords in CD3 are more willing to sell out for the highest commercial rent than landlords in CD2, but somehow I doubt that.
I love the anti-American, anti-chain attitude here. I've been a reader of EVGrieve for about four years so it's not like I'm a newbie who just happened to pop in on this site.
Capitalism and everything that falls under its auspices (i.e., franchises and chain stores) are blessedly American but because certain aspects don't jive with your feelings of nostalgia for the neighborhood, you resort to the typical "not in my back yard" whining kidult approach to something so purely American and legal. Pretty amazing.
So go protest the powers that be if you're so incensed. And good luck with that (yes, sarcasm). I'd love to see just how many of you actually do get away from your computer and head to a community board meeting to air your complaints (maybe four out of hundreds that could?). Heh.
You had me at anti-american.
8:55,
I trust that you are opposed to all forms of zoning, correct?
"blessedly American"
God bless America. The land of froyos and the home of cupcakes. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A.
i have no desire to protest business. as that isn't the foundation america was built on...and nor should it be one of our village...
but for you out there that like to protest 711...why arent you protesting Red Mango?
very strange how you pick and choose your chains to fight off
The gelato place is the best. Absolutely delicious. My highest recommendation.
@ 8:55 -- To describe a zoning amendment for the entire city to allow community self-determination as "not in my back yard" is to call self-rule and freedom nothing more than individual selfish greed. Stalinists would say so. Good luck with that. To me, such a zoning amendment is an assault on corporatocracy, a means to level the ground and gain leverage over land (in a way that special zonings can't), and a defense of human community, sense of place, identity, especially New York identity.
What I lose patience with is doctrinaire Post-Marxists who are too cynical to believe in change so they look down on every attempt at self-derermination as naive. That's why the Left is so fragmented. I mean, which side are they on? So maybe we're stuck with capitalism, but history is not over.
Yes, I hope more corporations come to NYC. I won't be happy until Citi Bank has full control over, not only my transportation, but the food I eat, the shows I watch on TV and the times I drop deuce!
Fashion by He -- On the contrary, Red Mango would come under NO711's proposed zoning amendment, like any chain. So if Red Mango wanted to open two stores within a couple of blocks in a neighborhood where you have to walk a mile for a supermarket, a dry cleaner, a bike shop or a credit union in ten miles, or a community center that's been waiting for an avaiable space but can't quite meet the chain-store-rent, the community board would be able to consider denying yet another Red Mango.
If you're asking why NO711 isn't using Red Mango as its banner example rather than 711, you don't have to reach far. RM is not an effective target: it's doesn't have a high profile (I'd never heard of it until yesterday); it's not a nation-wide comical symbol of junk and suburbia and the lowest of chain offerings just above gas station; their HQ is not planning to open 100 stores in two years.
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