RIP Franchises of our youths

[King Bob]

Yeti once took me to a now-closed bookstore in the Mission that apparently specialized in writings on anarchy or something like that. I bought a book by the art/cultural critic Herbert Read, and the clerk looked at it and said, "One of the most intelligent anarchists ever."

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

Alexander Book Company in SF is closing too. I don't know that bookstore. Maybe Yeti does. 

I know of it, but have never been inside. Nonetheless, I'm having a sad.

KB, there is an Anarchist bookstore in the Haight if you've got a hankerin. It is right next door to the new Borderlands Bookstore on Haight near Masonic.

[King Bob]

I wasn't really interested in anarchy; we just happened to be down there. Did the other Borderlands close? Wasn't it near the pirate store, and that store with all the skulls and fossils? There used to be a couple of good used bookstores on Haight, but I haven't been down there in 20 years or so.

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

The Valencia Borderlands is closed and they are in a temp space on Haight near Cole while they finish the "to the studs" refurb of their new perm home

[Drunk Monk]

I love Distractions, but I don't think I ever bought anything from there...

One of Haight-Ashbury’s oldest stores, popular with Burning Man crowd, could close after 41 years
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[url=https://www.sfchronicle.com/author/roland-li/]Roland Li
April 10, 2023Updated: April 10, 2023 12:38 p.m.

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Sabrina Tseng shops at Distractions in the Haight, which has been selling clothing since 1976. But, the business could close this fall if a buyer isn't found. Owner Jim Siegel wants to retire.
Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle
Distractions, one of Haight-Ashbury’s oldest shops, could close this fall — a victim of lower pandemic era foot traffic and the retirement of founder Jim Siegel after almost a half-century career.
The potential savior: A buyer who would be willing to update the store’s clothing and costume merchandise, and modernize its pen-and-paper sales system for the digital age.
Siegel, who’s known as the “Godfather of the Haight,” is accepting offers and hopes to make a six-figure deal for the store at 1552 Haight St. A sale would include all unsold merchandise and furniture and fixtures. If a buyer can’t be found, he plans to shut down by September.
More important than price, he said, is finding someone who will honor the hippie culture principles that have defined his business, which opened in May 1982: “peace, no racism, everybody’s equal, love everybody.”
“I never did anything for money,” he said. “We wanted to keep the spirit of the hippie movement alive.”


Left: Items for sale in the window of the Distractions store in the Haight in San Francisco. Right: A “For Sale” sign in the window of the Distractions store in the Haight in San Francisco. Photos by Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle
But economic realities mean that the store — which offers Victorian dresses, steampunk costumes popular with Burning Man attendees, cannabis bongs and trinkets from around the world — isn’t sustainable in its current form.
In 2020, during shelter-in-place orders, annual sales plunged to around $100,000 from around $650,000 per year before the pandemic.
The return of Burning Man last year led to a boom in business, with sales reaching $800,000. But the past few months have been rough, with foot traffic around half of pre-pandemic levels and relentless, record-breaking storms discouraging shoppers from going outside. Siegel said he has lost around $60,000 since last fall. The store has just two employees, down from five in its heyday.
“Haight Street’s a ghost town on weekdays,” he said. “If you’re not a completely neighborhood-serving business, you’re going to be hurting.”
Though, data from the Haight Ashbury Merchants Association shows that 19 empty storefronts have been leased in the last two years and the neighborhood's vacancy rate is lower than before the pandemic.
And Distractions is far from the only long-tenured San Francisco retailer on the verge of disappearing. Alexander’s Books at 50 Second St. is shuttering after 32 years. Just For You Cafe in Dogpatch closed last week after 43 years.
Even before COVID, Siegel was hoping to retire and said he hasn’t stayed updated on merchandise trends.
“I haven’t been giving my store the love it needs,” he said. “Someone needs to reinvent it.”

Jim Siegel stands in front of the former location of Distractions in 1982.
Courtesy of Jim Siegel
The store also doesn’t have an active website or any online sales capabilities, said Siegel, who calls himself “anti-tech.” But a rich person — maybe someone working in tech or a Burning Man enthusiast with the right attitude — could   save the store, he said.
The Summer of Love made Haight-Ashbury world famous and drew Siegel to the neighborhood when he was 16, after he ran away from home in Pennsylvania “to be a hippie.”
As a gay, liberal teenager who protested the Vietnam War, he was bullied and beaten up in school. In San Francisco, he found his community. He joined Haight-Ashbury Switchboard, a free information hub for residents to find out about services like housing and social events.
“I was an outcast. Everybody welcomed me with open arms,” Siegel said. “I’m very blessed.”
In 1976, in a parallel to today, Siegel’s friend Bob Stubbs was ready to retire and shut down Phoenix, the last smoke shop in the Haight at the time.
Siegel and two friends, Rick Stypman and Dennis Stone, thought it would be a tragedy and wanted to take over. 
Siegel was 19 and had no business experience. But he and both his friends had each qualified for $5,000 grants through a predecessor to Social Security Disability Insurance, the equivalent of $26,600 each in 2023.
There was plenty of cash to fund a store that rarely turned a profit hawking Indian bedspreads and vintage posters, with Stone selling plants in the front of the store and Stypman managing pet supplies in a loft space.
But the partnership didn’t last, and Siegel eventually opened  Distractions as sole proprietor in 1982. Haight-Ashbury was struggling amid the crack cocaine epidemic, with boarded up stores and Siegel remembers being robbed at gunpoint.
“It was a boarded up ghetto,” Siegel said. During the pandemic, the neighborhood has seen retail crime and grappled with tent cities, but Siegel said it’s far safer now compared to the 1980s.
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Customers Taylor Preminger and Luna Cuevas laugh as they shop at the Distractions store in the Haight in San Francisco. The store is known for selling clothing to Burning Man attendees.
Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle
As the counterculture shifted, Distractions followed, selling new wave, punk rock, reggae, Grateful Dead and skateboard culture merchandise over the years.
In 1995, Siegel and friends threw the first electronic music party at Burning Man under the group Consortium of Collective Consciousness. A few years later, Distractions became the festival’s first San Francisco ticket outlet, as recounted in a city report that led to the shop becoming designated a Legacy Business.
Siegel remembers Burning Man growing more and more popular, and one year Distractions had $1 million in cash from ticket sales hidden in the back of the store. He said Burning Man eventually provided a safe. In 2012, Burning Man sold out for the first time and switched exclusively to online ticketing, Siegel said, but customers still flock to the store for costumes and gear and a substantial portion of its yearly sales happen in August. 
“Burning Man is what has kept the store afloat in the last 20 years,” he said.
The festival didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
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People pass by the Distractions store in the Haight in San Francisco. The clothing shop has been open since 1976, but could close this fall if a buyer isn't found. Owner Jim Siegel says he’s seen less business since the pandemic began.
Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle
Siegel lives by Alamo Square and plans to visit Haight-Ashbury regularly, even after retirement. “This is my whole social life. Every one of my friends is from the store,” he said.
He’s saddened by recent deaths of many “old timers” in the hippie community. But he feels part of a still vibrant neighborhood, getting to know the homeless youths who hang out near the store. In turn, they’ve helped chase down would-be shoplifters.
“It feels like we’ve been protected by guardian angels,” he said.
For all the struggles of the pandemic years, Siegel remains optimistic about the future of both the neighborhood and the city.
“San Francisco has reinvented itself so many times in the 50 years I’ve been there. I think it will reinvent itself again,” Siegel said. “I always want to have hope.”

[King Bob]

That font on the window is familiar, but I don't know if I ever went in there.

[thatguy]

I just remember going to the Aardvark's Odd Ark with KB in ancient times. That one is long gone.


--tg

[King Bob]

I haven't heard that name in ages. I remember there was also a store on Haight called (I think) Ameba down near the park that sold rave clothes. Christina got a dress with a sperm print - she used to wear it to baby showers - and I got a good eye ring there. I lost that ring and still miss it.

[Drunk Monk]

Bed Bath & Beyond files for bankruptcy, announces going-out-of-business sale before closing its doors for good
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Customers leave a Bed, Bath and Beyond store on August 31, 2022 in Larkspur, California. Photo credit Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

  By Joe Hiti, Audacy

an hour ago
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In a statement released Sunday morning, Bed Bath & Beyond announced that it had filed for bankruptcy. The company said its current plans are to sell off its merchandise and then go out of business.
The more than 360 Bed Bath & Beyond locations are expected to remain open for now, according to the company’s website.

“Thank you to all of our loyal customers. We have made the difficult decision to begin winding down our operations,” the statement said.

The company shared that closing sales at its locations, which includes its buybuy BABY stores, will start on Wednesday, as it begins the process of liquidating its inventory.
“Millions of customers have trusted us through the most important milestones in their lives – from going to college to getting married, settling into a new home to having a baby,” Sue Gove, Bed Bath & Beyond’s CEO, said in a statement. “We deeply appreciate our associates, customers, partners, and the communities we serve, and we remain steadfastly determined to serve them throughout this process.”
Anyone with one of the company’s well-known 20% off coupons will be able to redeem them Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. But on Wednesday, they will stop accepting them, instead offering“deep discounts” as part of the going-out-of-business sale.

Bed Bath & Beyond, which was known for having everything and anything, now follows in the seemingly all-too-familiar trend of retailers from the last century that have been slow to adapt to the changing industry — like the millennial favorite Toys “R” Us. With the online shopping giant Amazon giving consumers the ability to buy everything from their couch, Bed Bath & Beyond has continuously seen its revenue dwindle.
“We missed the boat on the internet,” Warren Eisenberg, one of Bed Bath & Beyond’s founders who is no longer with the company, told Wall Street Journal in an interview.

The New Jersey-based company was founded in 1971 and operates locations in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and Puerto Rico. But what was once a successful retail chain has now turned into a failing business, as the company’s bankruptcy filing says it has $5.2 billion in debt and assets of just $4.4 billion.
The company received $240 million in financing on Sunday, but the funds will only help it stay afloat long enough to close its stores and wind down operations.
Consumers are encouraged to seek out discounts at the store later this week. It also noted that anything purchased before Wednesday can be returned until May 24, with all sales happening after Wednesday being final. The store will also no longer accept gift cards on May 8.

There was a BB&B at the hub in Fremont. I frequented that during lunch breaks when I lived & worked I. Fremont.

[Greg]

I worked at bed and bath in Daly City.

[King Bob]

I used to be entertained by all the random products they had, but didn't shop there often - and after Target opened near us, we could more easily get anything we used to go there for.

[Drunk Monk]

San Francisco's beloved Cole Hardware to close downtown location
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Sam Mauhay-Moore, SFGATE
May 24, 2023
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Cole Hardware is closing its Ninth Street location by the end of this month. 
Screen shot via Google Maps
Cole Hardware is closing its South of Market location on Ninth Street, adding to the growing list of downtown San Francisco's newly shuttered storefronts. 


The store at 345 Ninth St. will stay open until May 31, Chief Financial Officer Rick Karp confirmed to SFGATE. 
“The pandemic came, and it basically went downhill from there, like most other businesses around. And it really hasn’t recovered,” Karp said. 
The company's other San Francisco locations have seen a stronger recovery, as they are in areas with larger residential populations and see a higher volume of foot traffic, Karp added. But business at the Ninth Street store, which opened in 2017, never stopped declining. 
“Even to this day, we keep losing what we call footsteps into the front door. There are less and less people shopping, and it just is financially unbearable. We can’t afford to keep it open,” Karp said. 
Karp added that part of this decline has to do with the rise of online shopping in recent years. 
“San Francisco residents need to be trying to rid themselves of their Amazon habit. Amazon is killing retail across the city,” Karp said. 
Cole Hardware's other downtown location, at 70 Fourth St., lost 60% of its business during the pandemic but has since been inching back at about 10% each year, Karp said. He hopes that in a few years' time, business there will be back to what it was in 2019. 
The closure necessitated two layoffs, but most employees will be transferred to other stores. The company will keep the 345 Ninth St. store as a storage space until its lease is up in three years — after that, Karp said, it's hard to say. 
Cole Hardware opened its first location in Cole Valley in the 1920s and has since grown to serve the San Francisco neighborhoods of North Beach, Russian Hill and downtown, as well as Rockridge in Oakland.  

I remember making the occasional run to here when working at that long lost mythical land of AFS. I always enjoyed how densely packed the shelves were in that claustrophobic SF downtown way. A delightful place to peruse but a terrible place to be when the big quake comes. I've thought about popping in whenever I'm nearby, just for old times sake, but invariably I'm too busy on some mission (off Mission).

[Greg]

How could you go to the Ninth Street Store from AFS if the Ninth Street Store only opened in 2017

[Drunk Monk]

It was that long lost mythical land of AFS where time was irrelevant...

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

We used to frequent the still extant Fourth St location. It was a really good hardware store.