Looks like the Nicoletta space will remain a pizzeria on Second Avenue at 10th Street.
Reps for the ever-expanding Artichoke Basille’s Pizza chain, which started in the East Village, are on this month's CB3-SLA agenda for a liquor license for 201 E. 10th St.
This questionnaire for the Sept. 16 meeting isn't online yet. However, the name of Artichoke co-founder Francis Garcia is on the application posted at the CB3 website.
Renovations are currently underway at the former Nicoletta space, which had a sizable dining room and outdoor cafe. Artichoke's plans for the venue aren't immediately known.
This would mark the second East Village location for Artichoke, which moved from its original East Village home (circa 2008) on 14th to a larger space across the street in June 2017.
Artichoke has been expanding nationwide with multi-unit franchise deals, most recently opening in Oakland, Calif.
As for Nicoletta, the much-heralded pizzeria from Michael White closed last December at this address after six-plus years in business. They are still delivering pizzas from an undisclosed location.
This corner space on 10th Street and Second Avenue had been on the retail market with a nearly $18,000 monthly ask.
Previously on EV Grieve:
Artichoke appears to be moving into a new space on 14th Street
Report of an early-morning fire at 328 E. 14th St., home of Artichoke Basille’s Pizza
Artichoke Basille's Pizza signage arrives at new 14th Street location
FDNY says fire that started at Artichoke was accidental
These excessive commercial rents have led to a lot of profitable small businesses close in recent years even bank branches have shuttered. The impact is more than the loss of that businesses service or products many of these businesses employ local residents in the work force. Many have had employment in these jobs for long periods of time. It is one thing to watch a business close because it does not attract customers or the owner wants to retire. The loss do to greed is a high price for a local community to pay.
ReplyDeleteThey don't need a liquor license for a pizza spot.
ReplyDeleteThat rent is actually very reasonable for a corner space on 2nd Ave. And the space actually went below ask at $16,500. The excessive amount of closures over the past year or so have much more to do with nearly doubling of the minimum wage since 2015 ( the knockout punch being the $2 increase January 1st) , and the introduction of the Paid Sick Leave law and Paid Family Leave Law both of which are paid for , not by the state , but by the small business owner. Rents have actually come down quite a bit over the past 2 years. Whether you are for or against these policies , you can not deny the fact that they have hurt Mom and Pop businesses. Small shop has 10 employees that work 40 hours per week. Give one employee a $2 raise and paid sick/family. That's about $5200. per week per employee. Grand total $52,000 per year. But it doesn't stop there because every vendor and supplier you have sent you a note Jan 1st that read ' Due to our increased labor costs we regrettable must raise our prices ..... ' So now you , the owner, have two choices; Do nothing and close shop or raise prices to reflect your new costs. The kicker is, if you choose the latter, you get bitched out by your customers who have failed to connect the dots and realize that the very policies they clamored for, the policies they said were right and just, are the reason why they have to pay a bit more. As I have said over and over on this site, as far as Living Wage goes, we are all in this together. If you really support the notion then you should be prepared to put your money where your mouth is. In an industry where margins are already extremely tight, the small biz owner should never have been expected to bare the costs alone.
ReplyDeleteHere we go again, more complaining about the minimum wage. This is about economics and how an economy actually works. Without a decent minimum wage, workers do not have disposable income. Without disposable income, they will not buy bagels or pizza bubble tea or other items sold by local retailers, much less anything else but the basics. Fact: Real wages have not increased in this country since 1974 while costs have gone up 300-400%. If you are a business owner who has been able to raise prices by over 400% since that time and you still cant figure out how to make a profit while wages have been flat, then either you are doing something wrong, or your rent is too high, or both.
ReplyDeleteI think 11:03am missed BagelGuy's point who, to the best of my knowledge, didn't complain but rather offered up the reality of the situation.
ReplyDeleteThis is not a minimum wage issue. Those businesses that have models based on chronically underpaying their employees shouldn't be in business anyways. The issue is that predatory landlords, hiked rents, the costs of getting off the ground (and sometimes renovating the mess previous tenants left behind) make entering the market virtually impossible for 'new' mom & pops. And who would want to work there, if the previous 4 businesses in the same space were out in under 18 months? What kind of security does that provide?
ReplyDeleteLandlords need to be penalized for empty storefronts, full stop.
Have to chime in here since we have been running S'MAC in the neighborhood since 2006 I can offer some perspective. It's not a minimum wage issue - that increase is finally putting a greater proportion of the customer's money where it should go. And yes, we are still at least another $5/hour short of where it should be.
ReplyDeleteAnd I am not saying that this isn't a huge and sudden burden that we have all had to deal with on top of everything else. But what I see is that most of us go into business knowing some of the costs that we cannot alter - and these are what the landlord will charge us and what the vendors will charge us and what the state will charge us. And we take these costs into account when designing our business model and price points and even though we may complain about them we just accept them as a given. However, when it comes to labor and wages for some reason we treat it differently. It's like the fucking sky will fall down on us if we pay people a living wage - when the reality is that it's just another line item on a p&l - we have to be able to treat it like we treat every other cost and adjust our business model accordingly. And there is usually a solution to be found if you think it through hard enough.
We have always had great longevity with our staff (ranging from 6-10 years working at our store) and I am telling you it's been great watching their paychecks grow into something they can actually live on and also seeing how much better they feel about it.
We have always felt blessed that S'MAC has survived it's share of ups and downs and I also know how close we have come to losing it over the past few years. And I know the feeling of lying awake at nights wondering if we will meet payroll come Friday. But as long as we survive I am glad to be able to spread some of that blessing onto the people that make it possible day in and day out - working for what is still a pittance.
Thank you, BagelGuy, for continuing to shed light on this. Clearly, people must come to expect that they'll see higher prices in order to pay for these needed changes. I guess when leases expire, businesses don't want to risk signing a lease without the knowledge that customers are willing to pay higher prices.
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ReplyDeleteI agree with some of the comments made by Cesar. Again , I am not saying I am against the living wage. All I am saying is that it costs money. Those tens of thousands of dollars have to come from somewhere. I gave a very clear example of that above. Every one of my 50 employees makes at least $17 per hour. Some as a high as $20 . This is not including management which is much higher still. That said , in my view rent is not the main issue. When the wage increases and paid sick came vendors and suppliers started raising their prices. They passed it along to us. Our payroll costs also also rose . So what do people expect to happen exactly? Of course prices will rise. Again I’m all for it but what drives me nuts is when people fail to connect the dots. You can’t have your paper goods go up , your produce costs go up , etc. Have a giant payroll increase to boot and not have prices go up as well. This is why you’re seeing all the closures. Rents have always been high and they have dropped dramatically over the past two years. Yet closures are now at hyper speed. People talk a good came with their anonymous posts but in reality what they do is go home and buy it on Amazon for less. We’ve been lucky with food because amazon can’t do what we do.
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ReplyDeleteEasy to pay those kind of rents when you sell pizza for $5 bucks a slice, CASH ONLY.
ReplyDeleteSorry my earlier comments were in the context of Nicoletta closing and Artichoke potentially taking over the space. The point I was trying to make was that when crafting our business models we ought to consider the market rent and occupancy costs, the state taxes as well as a living wage to be our "nut". And once we have that "nut" if we can sell enough units per months to cover it then great, we have a business. Nicoletta and Artichoke are both ostensibly in the same business dealing with the same regulatory/labor costs but the customers reward one of them with lines out the door while the other can't drum up enough business to stay afloat.
ReplyDeleteBut the failure of Nicoletta to stay in business cannot be blamed on increased minimum wages not rising rents. They just didn't have a viabLe business model.
Feel sorry for the neighbors for all the noise that will be emanating from the drunk douche bros that will be lining out the door here. Already horrible down the block at 13th Step, etc.
ReplyDeleteAgreed on Nicoletta. I was speaking towards the recent uptick in closures across NYC this past year. I believe for many the last increase was a final nail in the coffin. Owners may have done everything you pointed out 6 years ago when they signed a lease. They didn’t see paid sick and a doubling of wages coming. They may have had a good product and a good plan. But they got crushed with the rising costs of goods vendors hit them with to compensate for their own rising labor costs. If you weren’t smart enough to raise prices in lockstep with your increases you woke up and found yourself in debt. I’ve heard this story from many EV and WV owners. My paper goods got pricier. ‘ My produce costs went up. My dairy went up. My payroll went from 8000 a week to 14000 a week.’ You can have the greatest product in the world and the best laid plan but when you start taking on those hits you can get knocked down. Meanwhile if amazon sells it for less the people will go to amazon without thinking twice. Very few connect the dots and say ‘Hey , I’ll pay more to support the extra costs it takes for a local shop to pay living wages. They take the lazy way out and blame landlords.. Amazon can’t do food so it’s a little different for us but still , the doubling of wages and paid sick ( all for it but the state should’ve covered it ) has a dollars and cents effect on everyone. Again , all for these causes but they come with a price.
ReplyDeleteI do feel terrible for anyone opening/running a business in NYC these days, as the costs are so high, so you need to be completely on the ball with your business. It's not like most of the US where you can casually open a place that you've dreamed off, and have a decent chance of making it work. NYC will chew you up.
ReplyDeleteI just want to say that I appreciate hearing directly from the business owners who are commenting here, b/c they are giving us a window into what running a business looks like from the INSIDE, a view we don't often get.
ReplyDeleteI also appreciate their honesty, b/c so many business owners will offer a line of self-serving BS instead of the truth.