Thursday, February 5, 2015

[Updated] State seizes B.A.D. Burger on Avenue A for nonpayment of taxes



The state's fluorescent SEIZED sticker arrived on the front door of B.A.D. Burger at 171 Avenue A near East 11th Street showing a nonpayment of taxes.



So, for now, the breakfast and burger diner is closed. (These seizures aren't always permanent, as we saw at Sahara East, among other businesses.)

B.A.D. Burger opened in late 2011.

Updated:

Per the B.A.D. Burger Facebook page:

"Hey folks, we are temporarily closed for a few days. We will keep you posted. For now stay warm and carry on! Spring is around the corner."

27 comments:

Anonymous said...

A typical example of State THEFT.
Taxation is theft.

Bill the libertarian anarchist

Anonymous said...

just weird
you would think a burger place right in the middle of all the bridge and tunnel frat boys drinking at bars on Avenue A would be a slam dunk

but this place always was empty and just look totally unappealing

Anonymous said...

Never understood this place. There's lots of unused space inside. There are a zillion things on the menu, none of worth writing home about. The service appears to be an afterthought.

blue glass said...

tried them once or twice
not great, not really even good
some stuff was actually tasteless
and the staff was not very pleasant
never went back
i won't miss these folks
they could take lessons from the new ice cream place (is it mikes?)

Anonymous said...

This is honestly the strangest place in the world. Always empty and food is just okay. I always thought it was a front for something else.

Gojira said...

Worst fried chicken I ever had, but the people who worked there were nice. Sorry for them.

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

Bill the libertarian anarchist

Seriously, are you for real? Do the kids and family members roll their eyes when you blurt that kind of stuff out at Thanksgiving?

Crazy Eddie said...

"Taxation is theft."

So much for the military. Or NYPD. Or FDNY. Support our troops? NOT! BTW, what's your and/or family service record?


BENGHAZI!

Anonymous said...

Here was my YELP Review:

OMG! no no no!

I was STARVING and the place was empy-ish. There were only 5 or so tables.
I was told to sit wherever we wanted. We did. And waited....... no menus, no water, no server. There were 2 servers on the floor and a lazy girl at the hostess podium eating fried food when I went up and got the menus. After sitting for 10 minutes, the waitress came over. I ordered ice water. There was only like a tiny portion of ice.
We ordered food. It took about 25 mins or so. when it arrived there was no silverware. The waitress just walked away. I got up and went to another table and grabbed some silverware. I had the Eggs Benedict. It was just ok. It could have come with more sauce. I drank my water to the bottom. I had to get up to get a refill since the waitress never came back to check in on us. I had to get up 3 times at this place to have a dining experience, which SUCKED.
I didn't want to leave a tip but my date knew the owner. I guess one of them used to own Veg City. ANYways I think he left 10%. I would have left nothing. SLACKERS!

Fire these people and I will play hostess, waitress, bartender and bus person.

Anonymous said...

libertarian anarchist = the first person to apply for public assistance, social security, complain about pot holes, insist we would all be better off if corporations had no rules to follow, remove all over-sight for Wall Street and bring the roaring 20's style of finance and ponzi schemes back, resort to only the strong "should" survive until they get old and feeble and need what tax payers to change their Depends and wipe their ass.

2:43 p.m. said...

Well, they live up to their name.

Giovanni said...

Coming Never: Bad Unidentified Flying Chicken Burger

Anonymous said...

Crazy Eddie and other commies:

Privatize the police and fire dept., and get the US military out of Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the 137 military bases outside the US.
Or do you like mass murder and gub'ment waste and inefficiency?

Read the book "How Diplomats Make War."

Anonymous said...

Take one issue and then another unrelated much worse issue, and finally another lesser issue that no really considers (but, most importantly, *you* do.) Then ask a question about an issue no would say "yes" to unless they wanted to be thought a total monster, and then throw in a couple blanket-statement issues that would never be resolved no matter what government (which should be abbreviated and use the letter "b,") system we lived under.

Then instruct that someone read a book that has all the answers.

Final note: Definitely be kind of condescending because people always react well to that.

Anonymous said...

4:40 -- love you!

Anonymous said...

Satsko's on Eldridge met the same faith in 2011....mooching off the system not paying a dime.

Anonymous said...

Well said 4:40

Anonymous said...

In a way, some taxation definitely seems like theft to me. I'll explain:

Let's say your burger place has $100,000 in revenue. Let's say you pay your employees $100,000 (total across all of them for the year).

You then owe a tax of $7,500 to the Feds for social security. Your employees have to pay an additional $7,500. Then of that $100K roughly 25% goes to the Feds. 10% to NYC.

So the final score is:

YOUR business revenue: $100,000
Employees pocket: $58,000
Government gets: 42+7K = $49,000
YOU get: $-7000

This does not factor in your rent, utilities, etc. But you get the idea. You work your ass off and end up losing money. BUT THE GOVERNMENT gets $49,000

That's not theft? Nope, 'cause it's legal.


Crazy Eddie said...

Commie, huh? My family has military combat records against Communism in Korea and Viet Nam. And yours?

And thank you, 4.40 PM.

I am well read of history, thank you, and I know the world stage is not always back or white. I guess we all know where Bill is coming from. I'm finished.

Anonymous said...

8:32, I'm trying to understand whyyou are paying $100,000 in salaries when you only have $100,000 in revenue. BUT I do agree that often (a lot often) numbers don't add up in favor for smaller businesses.

john penley said...

Actually one of the owners is a really nice guy and he is a very long time neighborhood resident who I know personally has helped many people when they were in trouble or were short on money for rent. The late legendary Dean Johnson was one of them. Get off his back I am sure he will fix this. And by the way folks as a Vietnam Era Vet I can definitely say we lost and they won and that war was stupid and a tragic waste of lives on both sides. Now those Vietnamese commies have first nation trading status with the USA.

Anonymous said...

Bill The Lib An has to be a personal friend of EVGrieve's. People who say things only half as outlandish are banned, while he gets free rein.

Anonymous said...

Bring back Superdive !

Anonymous said...

Bad Burger seems like the kind of affordable food we could use around here. I wish they would just figure it out.

Anonymous said...

1:47 Let's say you can run the place with 3 people on the clock at any time (which is probably not enough). Pay them $10/hour. That's 30/hour as your cost. Be open for 10 hours/day (which also might be short). That's $300 per day. That's $9000 per month. That's $108,000 per year.

chris flash said...

I had a similar BAD experience at BAD Burger. My date and I stopped in to give it a try. Except for one table occupied by another couple, the place was empty. It took a very long time to get a menu (the single waitress didn't seem to be overly concerned with providing menus nor with taking our orders)and it took FOREVER to get our food, which was....BAD. I never went back.

If the owner is a cool guy, as John says, perhaps he's not aware of what's going on there, though, as they're almost always empty, he must have an idea.

As for the tax issue, it IS theft. I don't know how ANY small business can survive the multiple extortions they are subject to. Rather than work out a deal with an alleged tax debtor beforehand, the Dept of Taxation shuts businesses down and locks them out FIRST, forcing them to pay whatever is demanded, lest they lose their entire investment.

As for those who claim that those taxes are needed for the city, perhaps they ought to look at real estate developers who get tax payer money to subsidize their market rate apts for the wealthy and tax abatements, as well as corporations that generate billions in ill-gotten gains (Goldman Sachs, for example) here in NYC that pay NO TAX at all.

Anonymous said...

I for one will miss them (if they don't reopen in "a few days"). The neighborhood needed and still needs more places like Bad Burger: pleasant, unrushed, and quiet enough that two people could take a booth and talk comfortably for a long time. They never had their act together well enough to feel formulaic. They weren't there to get people drunk and they didn't attract drunks. The hamburgers were better than I expected, every time. The staff was genuinely nice, chronically forgetful about orders or requests, and sincerely apologetic about whatever they inevitably forgot. I think it's a real possibility that they simply forgot to pay their tax bill, like it was one more side of broccoli or refill of coffee, and hope they manage to make it right.