Curses! Foiled Again!

I drive most days past the corner of Randolph and Fairview, in Highland Park in Saint Paul.

The problem is, I always drive through at a time of the day when coffee is the last thing on my mind. But even I noticed the, er, brewing competition between local stalward Brewberry's - a former video store that's been supplying the neighborhood's poetry, craft and sandwich needs, plus coffee, for nearly a decade.

Across the street is one of those lots where businesses go to die - it was most recently a Blimpy sub shop (is it just me, or is that chain dying the big death? I just had the worst sub of my life at the one on University two weeks ago), before that it was...er, something else.

Then, a few weeks ago, I noticed a Caribou Coffee moved into the other lot. Ironic, I thought. I should write about this.

Lilekst did.

I understand the desire for local independent merchants – I prefer to patronize my local hardware store rather than go to Home Depot, for example, but each has its advantages. I just hate to feel like a traitor to the rich tapestry of human history because I want to have a cup of coffee near a fireplace with those lemon scones the chain carries. The crumbly ones. Yum.

This story says a lot about Saint Paul.

Part of the story involves the doughty small businessperson:

[Owner Jan] Nelson promptly looked at her shop [when the news of the impending Caribou broke] and listened to her customers, including sympathetic architects and designers.

"They'd say: 'Jan, your building's exterior doesn't match the warm interior,' " she said. "It was very boring and if you weren't brought here by someone, you'd whiz right by. I wanted it to be a little jewel box."

She repainted the building light green, extended her hours and put up a snazzy new sign, telling anyone driving past that hers is a neighborhood coffee shop. And the neighbors, irked by yet another chain threatening their area's quaint residential feel, stood strong.

On the other hand, we have the representative of the city government that does so much to stifle business in this city:

"Sometimes the competitive side of business goes too far," said City Council Member Pat Harris, whose ward includes the shops. "But the great thing is to see people rallying around a local St. Paul business."

"Sometimes the competitive side of business goes too far". That's what business is up against in Saint Paul.

Saint Paul's city government, of course, doesn't think it's going too far when it's serving as a competitor itself. A few years ago, a businessman who lived not too far from the coffee shops sank his life savings into building a gun shop in my neighborhood, the less-tony Midway, three miles north of the competing coffee shops. The local Neighborhood Council - an unofficial level of government - engaged in a years-long campaign to drive the store out of business; sometimes competition "going too far" isn't the only problem business faces in this city.

And as to the "neighbors" Harris refers to?

Picket signs, egg tossing and "corporate scum" graffiti welcomed Caribou Coffee when it opened one of its 100 Minnesota branches right across the street from Brewberry's.

I'll be at Dunn Brothers...oh, wait. It's becoming a chain, and a fairly successful one. What's a guy to do?

Posted by Mitch at November 15, 2004 04:07 AM | TrackBack