Either city people moved there and opened a fancy place-they've-always-wanted-to-open-but-couldn't-afford-to-in-the-big-city, or these places are getting some sort of swampy money hoping to attract blues and start turning the place purple, vote out the middle-aged white guys. Perhaps?
I go with the latter theory, some kind of swampy money.. it happened in my small town of Half Moon Bay... we turned from an isolated farming community, to ... all of the above and more.. I feel like running for council just to peek behind the curtain.
Half Moon Bay is also a not-inconvenient drive from SF and Silicon Valley. I figure it's just the hydraulic pressure of stratospheric real estate prices in those nearby locales pushing in on you.
I live in a small town in rural Pennsylvania. We don’t have the fancy bars. Basically we have the wannabe high end restaurants for a drink, but they close at nine or ten. Then we have the dive bars that close at 2. My favorite dive bar is in a restored saloon. To this day it is still called a saloon and it is cash only. It really does have a vintage feel to it, that is why I like it so much. The two people that own it are one millennial co owner of a mom and pop grocery store and the other millennial looks like a biker chick, very nice people. Most people are afraid to talk to those covered in tattoos, but I have learned not to judge people too quickly
We also have coffee shops. The first one in our town was created by an antique shop owner, who hated traveling 30 miles for a good cup of coffee. Before he sold it to another couple, he remodeled and restored his antique store into a vintage 1950s soda shop, but it was a coffee shop instead with real penny candy in it as well. He was a Gen X guy. The one in Ridgway was started by a couple I know, who also restored a former clothing store and it has evolved into an informal meeting place. We have a bakery in a restored, vintage department store, a French breakfast place in a restored 1930s home. All of these places use repurposed furniture and they source their food locally. My favorite place in Ridgway is the restored bank that was turned into a brewery/restaurant/hotel. That was also started by a Gen X. All of these owners are locals.
So your experience in my part of the country would be a little different.
St Mary’s, it is ten miles east of Ridgway. I grew up in Ridgway. I married a man with deep roots in St Mary’s. His family was one of the first settlers in St Mary’s.
My grandfather in Ridgway was named Joseph Eagen. His father started Eagen Hardware. It no longer exists and hasn’t existed since the 1960s.
It’s close enough to Tulsa that it can feed off the spillover. I see that where my mom lives in the sticks ( pop. 16k) - the big college 40 minutes away has enough big events that people going there have to get a reasonably priced room at a holiday inn that far away. So there’s enough demand about 15-20 weekends a year that can keep a few restaurants brewpubs and coffee shops going year round. It’s also just close enough that some local kids can drive to that college a couple times a week as part-time students and live with their parents to avoid the room and board - they work at the small town shops. The brewpub in town is owned by one of the farmers’ family members. The nearby hospital also attracts doctors, nurses, etc. from a 40-mile radius, there’s a few banks in town, lawyers, accountants… so a town twice the size like Bartlesville can support that kind of stuff easily on 1% of the population.
This is what's happening in our smallish town. To the T. I don't know about funding but definitely coming in with big cash. Definitely a subversive push to turn the state blue, which I believe is organized and non random. Jury's out on of the two are related though.
Biscuits and gravy, that's where it's at. Make a good homemade bacon, sausage, and corn beef hash, with good hashbrowns and hearty pancakes and there will be loyal customers for life. The customer is always right, and the customer is a local, so the delicious American food needs to be honored, served, enjoyed, and celebrated. As a vacationer that is what I would hope for and expect and be thrilled to get.
Waffle House is always my go to when traveling (outside Sheetz and Rutters territory, at least.) It may not be the best food, but it will equal most random places and be a hell of a lot cheaper.
waffle house at breakfast is run like a well oiled machine. Fast, excellent service and decent food at a good price. Your coffe cup will never be empty. The staff may not be much to look at, but they get the job done. i always leave a fat tip.
For me it's eggs benedict. Whenever we're out camping and we pull into a place for brekkie and they have eggs benny on the menu, I go for it. Traditional, not the 'California' version with avocado! It's all about the hollandaise! Oh, and a nice runny, perfectly poached egg. And when I get a good one, I'm thrilled. There's a small cafe in Weed, CA that is still the gold standard for me when it comes to eggs benny. Some have come close though...
Processed food causes obesity... stuff like bread... pancake mixes etc... all loaded with sugar... and made from inputs that convert to sugar in the body.
I've noticed this same trend, even on the Washington State island where I live. I'm convinced this is driven by millennials with money from other sources. They believe if they build it, it will come. But it doesn't.
they probably are getting some sort of kickback from the city, look into it. Free money to open business in blighted areas. They call them CRA's where I live(community reinvestment agencies). It was 1970's initiative that forces banks to give money away to downtrodden areas. Of course cities jumped on that gravy train so they could dole out the cash themselves under the cover of redevelopment and such. Its a huge shell ganme where I live.
Frankly I wish we could do that where I live. I'm in a medium sized Texas city with several dozen blocks of commercial infrastructure from the 1920s-1940s that is mostly sitting there falling apart and empty other than a few downmarket antique stores/muffler shops/low budget karate dojos while the developers continue to pave cattle pastures and sorghum fields to build shitty houses and strip malls on the edge of town. They are certainly getting kickbacks of some kind too and it's inevitable; I'd prefer that the city and county where I live incentivize keeping the historic buildings from literally collapsing. But then again this is a city which can support some level of bougie millennial craft bars and bookstores, not a tiny town in the middle of nowhere.
Chris' post makes us think about how sad it is to consider that people maybe don't need physical places to eat and shop at all, what with the Amazon and the netflix and the Walmart delivery.
It’s not that we’ve run out of options, but rather that “new & trendy” prevails over “old & proven” in many people’s minds. (I’m typing this on an iPhone 8+ b/c later models’ features add nothing I need. I’m the antithesis of Apple’s marketing strategy.)
The author certainly takes the long way ‘round the barn to express the simple (but profound) thought that the Earth has finite resources and how efficiently we use them determines our species’ end date.
I’m glad he ridicules those who fantasize about star travel being mankind’s salvation. There is
NO “dilithium crystal” that pulls energy out of its own ass.
We have large slices of people eliminated periodically by rat/flea borne plagues or influenza or “bat/pangolin” viruses. What’s going to happen when we drop onto the rare Class M planet that mysteriously has no intelligent life? Could there be an environmental cause that will wipe out our expedition, like an indigenous flesh eating bacteria that will turn humans into mush?
So the question arises: Who has moral righteousness on their side - a) the extremely impoverished of today, or b) a few extremely distant generations near the end of our species? Do we end our species “early” in a trade off for the extremely impoverished of today improving to merely “poor”?
It’s ironic that the Industrial Revolution led to a large segment of the population becoming unnecessary surplus, which has turned its attention to overbreeding, hastening the eventual end of humanity.
It could also be lots of people leaving blue states because of terrible policies & high prices for everything from gas, taxes, food, housing - finding out they can get a HUGE bang for their buck in flyover country - & then bringing their f’ed up blue politics w/ them & bingo! A state turns purple or blue. AZ & CO fairly recent examples
I would love to listen to a discussion of this article between Chris and David Gornoski. Mimetic desire. We don't know what we want until we know what others want--and then we want that. My nascent understanding of this only helps me identify it when I see it--but not enough to predict, nor what to do to mitigate its effects on my own thinking, feeling, desires, etc.
The cultural descent into 'Brave New World' hedonism has distorted our rational thought. Bankers are giving loans to businesses that think 9,0000 people can support a chic bar with $25 drinks. A freshman in high school would know better.
We have eaten our own heritage, made it so ignoble to be a tradesman, a farmer, a laborer--that anything that hints as that culture must be hidden and the urban elite lifestyle is fetishized to a point that everything is 'chic'--and quickly strip-mall-ish in its effort to not be strip mall-ish.
Yeah, I know what you mean. I see it here in Vermont -- where Californians and New Yorkers show up and open a rarely ever actually open "farm stand/yoga studio/latte bar" for a few years and then go out of business. I've been puzzled myself and figured it was: 1) money laundering, 2) witness protection plan, 3) stupidity.
Meanwhile, have you been to Bucees? There's your supply and demand right there.
Oh gosh, "farm stand/yoga studio/latte bar" is a perfect description of what's happening in Vermont. And yes, it's out-of-staters who've decided that what rural people really need is another unique restaurant that serves food we've never heard of.
To wit: in the nearby village of Weston (famously home to the Vermont Country Store) there was once a lovely, family kind of inn with a nice, normal, restaurant. The "Inn at Weston" it was called. The owners sold and it's now been turned into "The Weston", owned by some big-city group with a chef from San Fran, making outrageously expensive food that none of the real locals eat. Of course, their target audience are well-heeled people with discriminating tastes from elsewhere - not that we don't already have Big Blue City snobs who live here full-time. Oh, and don't bring your under-12 child, they're not welcome in the astronomically expensive rooms and suites. Wonder how long it will last.
goodness, that is pricey! "The Art of Relaxation" indeed...lol...Meanwhile, the best food local people can find is whatever they got at the Maplefields.
A lot to think about here; could be the economy is starting to take a toll on peoples ability to go out for entertainment. I noticed here in WA in a business park of probably 25 available spaces 9 were now empty. I also think what use to make towns culture unique was that it was just that, unique. Now the internet dictates the cool and uncool, everybody is offered the same food, the same clothing and shoe choices, the same ladder brands at the "big box stores". We've commercialized everything. I still can not pronounce "charcuterie", lol.
Which begs the question - Is "everything ugly" because we, (our society), have moved so far to the left that we can no longer create, or appreciate beauty, OR, have we somehow lost our ability to appreciate, or create beauty, which has caused our cultural shift to the left?
Great question. My gut response: both. We don't have the courage, tenacity, nor patience to create works of great beauty--AND--our 'beauty detection equipment' is malfunctioning due to the dearth of beauty. We're unaccustomed to it. Now it frightens us instead of inspiring...bsn
2) Originality occurs in isolation. Communication breeds copying better ideas. (See #1)
Not a defense, just reality.
British gunmakers build the world’s finest rifles & shotguns; they are hand fitted and no parts are interchangeable. Repairs require the weapon to be returned to the UK so a new part can be handmade & fitted.
American & Italian gunmakers manufacture similar weapons using CNC machinery. Parts are 100% interchangeable. I say “similar” b/c while they lack the mystique of the über expensive British guns, the targets observe no difference.
I am told there is a restaurant blood bath happening in Australia and NZ... mortgages rates rent and inflation has sapped discretionary spending... and restaurants are one of the first to get hit
Same thing happening in Canada. Refugees priced out of Toronto trying to make your assembly line Urban Tattooed Lumberjack artisanal-bespoke-craft-farm-to-table smokehouse-eatery-neo-speakeasy work in bombed out-towns like Brantford and Timmins that lost all of their industry decades ago. They only survive due to a local diploma mill "uni" addicted to foreign students, wealthy and connected First Nations honchos, and elderly Boomers sitting on multiple cottages while their grandkids face $3000/mo. rents in Toronto because they can't stand said towns.
This wonderful piece also put me to mind of Isaac Simpson's piece, "There's going to be a war in Montana". The moneyed, Atlantic-reading managerial class is a threat to every community they invade.
I lived in north central Oklahoma for over a decade, and saw several "cocktail bar" kinds of places try and open (Dang it, Bray, why we gotta keep having similar experiences ... ). The suspicion about "blue money" trying to influence these smallish towns feels to me like it's reading too much into the phenomenon. The problem as I saw it was a generational wealth problem. A rising generation of entrepreneurs (note the mentions of GenX coffee shop people and tattoed Millennial bar owners in these comments) are trying to go into business for themselves, having realized that nobody's coming to save them and they're going to have to create their own income stream. But they either don't know how to enter a solid service industry, or "don't want to have a JOB-job," believing there's no fulfillment in doing the 8-5 grind they watched their dad get slowly worn down by. Because they don't precisely know what to do (and/or never acquired a truly marketable job skill) they tend toward influencer-esque business attempts, like cocktail bars and "venues". But the most popular places to eat in the small town where I lived were the longstanding lunch-counter joint that had been open 90 years, and the Mexican family-run place out by the highway, and one of the most celebrated openings in the town's business world was when a local guy hung out a shingle as ... an auto mechanic.
Bottom line, this is supply and demand, right out in the open. The invisible hand of the market will rule, no matter what Instagram tells midwest kids is coastal cool.
Everybody likes good food and drink. The culinary scene in the USA has been improving for decades. On the other hand, you have to have customers and you have to know your customers. Rural Kansas- probably not the place to push avant garde mixology. But every case is unique.The difference between the towns you’ve described is that one has a vital industry at scale and one does not. The oil industry pays well. And contrary to a lot of hype, it’s not going anywhere.
The solution to a lot of this shit politically is less politics, less government, less spending, less sanctimony, less hatred, more freedom and individual responsibility. People can figure out what makes sense for them. The government does a poor job of that and the media is toxic and drives everybody nucking futs. The people who want to be trannies can live in Portland. The oeople who want to be grannies can live in Oklahoma. I don’t care. But we have to shrink the beast that is devouring all of us. Slavery is not all it’s cracked up to be.
The rational solutions you propose have been opposed by half the population since the first hunter brought the first game animal back to the fire and the debate ensued about size of shares and the order in which people got to eat. “You eat what you kill” is the scariest thought in the world to the “takers.”
I do accounting in a rural state - starting restaurants/event centers that cater to no one has always been a thing. Usually it is people that grew up in an urban area and have arts or social sciences background. For some reason they want to recreate their liberal ideals in a very conservative area.
Unlike most locals that start businesses they often use grants or other government programs to get started. When a business starts with unearned funds they seem to forget that they need actual customers and virtue signaling alone doesn't pay the bills. They operate for a couple of years and then they fail.
My opinion: a group of people are tired of the urban rat race and romanticize about opening a bar/music venue/coffee shop/restaurant/hand made gift store in a small town. Then the pandemic hits and their house is worth way more than it should be so they cash out to follow their dreams. The state and local gov’ts throw redevelopment money at them and presto, that old building in town gets restored into a new business. There’s a huge grand opening with lights and banners and politicians and reporters.
Then boom, reality hits and after a few months their dream crashes and burns. Those small town people have no interest in organically grown, ecologically transported, sustainably processed $10 cups of coffee. Who knew???
Is it as bad as our longed for and well planned overseas family trip to the UK resulting in the backseat occupants - three of the rascals - reading books (this was in the 80's when life was simpler) ALL the while we drove through THE most remarkable historical sites and picture-perfect villages ?? As encouragement to other somewhat disillusioned parents our 'lot' are now all well educated both in life and academia and have instilled a lust for knowledge in all of our seven gorgeous grandchildren....eg the first stop on overseas holidays is always the local museums. They are our secret weapon at quiz nights where we smugly and happily elicit sympathy for having to drag along the kids....So take heart ye with younger offspring.
Maybe, but three times in the last month or so I've seen family groups in restaurants with one or more of the kids wearing headphones. Zuckerburg et al want them wearing VR goggles from birth.
It is totally different ballgame now for sure ; and a very scary one. Beautifully planned and executed by those behind the scenes that (I refuse to call them "who") are after our very minds as well as bodies.
I always wondered what happened to those clowns taking desk spaces in WeWork offices ... drinking free coffee and beer all day long ... and assuming that just being there would lead to a successful business...
Either city people moved there and opened a fancy place-they've-always-wanted-to-open-but-couldn't-afford-to-in-the-big-city, or these places are getting some sort of swampy money hoping to attract blues and start turning the place purple, vote out the middle-aged white guys. Perhaps?
Some of it is city people who moved in from California -- see what I wrote last year:
https://chrisbray.substack.com/p/to-the-stars-through-difficulties
I go with the latter theory, some kind of swampy money.. it happened in my small town of Half Moon Bay... we turned from an isolated farming community, to ... all of the above and more.. I feel like running for council just to peek behind the curtain.
Half Moon Bay is also a not-inconvenient drive from SF and Silicon Valley. I figure it's just the hydraulic pressure of stratospheric real estate prices in those nearby locales pushing in on you.
Middle of Oklahoma is a different story.
Yea, exactly. That's just local NorCal idiocy bleeding into the surrounding territory.
True
You should definitely run for a council seat!
Why hello fellow Half Moon Baysian.
Jetty Wave comes immediately to mind.
I live in a small town in rural Pennsylvania. We don’t have the fancy bars. Basically we have the wannabe high end restaurants for a drink, but they close at nine or ten. Then we have the dive bars that close at 2. My favorite dive bar is in a restored saloon. To this day it is still called a saloon and it is cash only. It really does have a vintage feel to it, that is why I like it so much. The two people that own it are one millennial co owner of a mom and pop grocery store and the other millennial looks like a biker chick, very nice people. Most people are afraid to talk to those covered in tattoos, but I have learned not to judge people too quickly
We also have coffee shops. The first one in our town was created by an antique shop owner, who hated traveling 30 miles for a good cup of coffee. Before he sold it to another couple, he remodeled and restored his antique store into a vintage 1950s soda shop, but it was a coffee shop instead with real penny candy in it as well. He was a Gen X guy. The one in Ridgway was started by a couple I know, who also restored a former clothing store and it has evolved into an informal meeting place. We have a bakery in a restored, vintage department store, a French breakfast place in a restored 1930s home. All of these places use repurposed furniture and they source their food locally. My favorite place in Ridgway is the restored bank that was turned into a brewery/restaurant/hotel. That was also started by a Gen X. All of these owners are locals.
So your experience in my part of the country would be a little different.
“To this day it is still called a saloon and it is cash only.”
PLEASE tell me you have to pay with gold or silver coins on the bar…
I know Ridgway, I was a child there and often think of retiring there, but what is the small town you mention in your first sentence?
St Mary’s, it is ten miles east of Ridgway. I grew up in Ridgway. I married a man with deep roots in St Mary’s. His family was one of the first settlers in St Mary’s.
My grandfather in Ridgway was named Joseph Eagen. His father started Eagen Hardware. It no longer exists and hasn’t existed since the 1960s.
I know St. Mary’s too. Thank you for responding, Rainey. My father used to work at Arco Speer graphite. How is the economy in Elk County?
Well, it is like everywhere else. People are struggling. The small businesses are hit the hardest and they are really the ones that keep us going.
It’s close enough to Tulsa that it can feed off the spillover. I see that where my mom lives in the sticks ( pop. 16k) - the big college 40 minutes away has enough big events that people going there have to get a reasonably priced room at a holiday inn that far away. So there’s enough demand about 15-20 weekends a year that can keep a few restaurants brewpubs and coffee shops going year round. It’s also just close enough that some local kids can drive to that college a couple times a week as part-time students and live with their parents to avoid the room and board - they work at the small town shops. The brewpub in town is owned by one of the farmers’ family members. The nearby hospital also attracts doctors, nurses, etc. from a 40-mile radius, there’s a few banks in town, lawyers, accountants… so a town twice the size like Bartlesville can support that kind of stuff easily on 1% of the population.
This is what's happening in our smallish town. To the T. I don't know about funding but definitely coming in with big cash. Definitely a subversive push to turn the state blue, which I believe is organized and non random. Jury's out on of the two are related though.
a good guess.
Biscuits and gravy, that's where it's at. Make a good homemade bacon, sausage, and corn beef hash, with good hashbrowns and hearty pancakes and there will be loyal customers for life. The customer is always right, and the customer is a local, so the delicious American food needs to be honored, served, enjoyed, and celebrated. As a vacationer that is what I would hope for and expect and be thrilled to get.
Cracker Barrel all the way.
Or Waffle House. Or a local place that has the same vibes...
Derbyshire’s law indicates to skip all Waffle Houses.
Waffle House is always my go to when traveling (outside Sheetz and Rutters territory, at least.) It may not be the best food, but it will equal most random places and be a hell of a lot cheaper.
waffle house at breakfast is run like a well oiled machine. Fast, excellent service and decent food at a good price. Your coffe cup will never be empty. The staff may not be much to look at, but they get the job done. i always leave a fat tip.
I’ve read a few thing’s lately that they’ve gone woke?
You mean “Bottom of the Barrel?” It’s turned to crap after the pandemic. So sad because it was unnecessary.
For me it's eggs benedict. Whenever we're out camping and we pull into a place for brekkie and they have eggs benny on the menu, I go for it. Traditional, not the 'California' version with avocado! It's all about the hollandaise! Oh, and a nice runny, perfectly poached egg. And when I get a good one, I'm thrilled. There's a small cafe in Weed, CA that is still the gold standard for me when it comes to eggs benny. Some have come close though...
And free shots o f Ozempic!
Traditional food will not make anyone obese. Sedentariness and uber-processed industrial non-natural fare will.
Processed food causes obesity... stuff like bread... pancake mixes etc... all loaded with sugar... and made from inputs that convert to sugar in the body.
You'd fit right in in my coastal seasonal-touristy beach town, then!
I've noticed this same trend, even on the Washington State island where I live. I'm convinced this is driven by millennials with money from other sources. They believe if they build it, it will come. But it doesn't.
Supply and demand has been replaced with field of dreams. If you build they will come ... in your dreams.
Kind of like Hollywood & superhero movies…
they probably are getting some sort of kickback from the city, look into it. Free money to open business in blighted areas. They call them CRA's where I live(community reinvestment agencies). It was 1970's initiative that forces banks to give money away to downtrodden areas. Of course cities jumped on that gravy train so they could dole out the cash themselves under the cover of redevelopment and such. Its a huge shell ganme where I live.
Frankly I wish we could do that where I live. I'm in a medium sized Texas city with several dozen blocks of commercial infrastructure from the 1920s-1940s that is mostly sitting there falling apart and empty other than a few downmarket antique stores/muffler shops/low budget karate dojos while the developers continue to pave cattle pastures and sorghum fields to build shitty houses and strip malls on the edge of town. They are certainly getting kickbacks of some kind too and it's inevitable; I'd prefer that the city and county where I live incentivize keeping the historic buildings from literally collapsing. But then again this is a city which can support some level of bougie millennial craft bars and bookstores, not a tiny town in the middle of nowhere.
Chris' post makes us think about how sad it is to consider that people maybe don't need physical places to eat and shop at all, what with the Amazon and the netflix and the Walmart delivery.
It’s a huge shell game everywhere anyone lives.
It's called mass delusional thinking... it's what happens when a civilization has run out of options
It’s not that we’ve run out of options, but rather that “new & trendy” prevails over “old & proven” in many people’s minds. (I’m typing this on an iPhone 8+ b/c later models’ features add nothing I need. I’m the antithesis of Apple’s marketing strategy.)
This fine article speaks to some of this https://thehonestsorcerer.substack.com/p/the-destiny-of-civilization
The author certainly takes the long way ‘round the barn to express the simple (but profound) thought that the Earth has finite resources and how efficiently we use them determines our species’ end date.
I’m glad he ridicules those who fantasize about star travel being mankind’s salvation. There is
NO “dilithium crystal” that pulls energy out of its own ass.
We have large slices of people eliminated periodically by rat/flea borne plagues or influenza or “bat/pangolin” viruses. What’s going to happen when we drop onto the rare Class M planet that mysteriously has no intelligent life? Could there be an environmental cause that will wipe out our expedition, like an indigenous flesh eating bacteria that will turn humans into mush?
So the question arises: Who has moral righteousness on their side - a) the extremely impoverished of today, or b) a few extremely distant generations near the end of our species? Do we end our species “early” in a trade off for the extremely impoverished of today improving to merely “poor”?
It’s ironic that the Industrial Revolution led to a large segment of the population becoming unnecessary surplus, which has turned its attention to overbreeding, hastening the eventual end of humanity.
It could also be lots of people leaving blue states because of terrible policies & high prices for everything from gas, taxes, food, housing - finding out they can get a HUGE bang for their buck in flyover country - & then bringing their f’ed up blue politics w/ them & bingo! A state turns purple or blue. AZ & CO fairly recent examples
And the pot
I'm still laughing at " one's teenage daughter sighs heavily ".
Great memories for the sighing teenage… she’ll never forget and always love her dear ol Dad . 😉
Someday Chris, she will thank you. Please be patient. She is one lucky daughter.
If I had a nickel... (and I have two teenage daughters)
Like!
I would love to listen to a discussion of this article between Chris and David Gornoski. Mimetic desire. We don't know what we want until we know what others want--and then we want that. My nascent understanding of this only helps me identify it when I see it--but not enough to predict, nor what to do to mitigate its effects on my own thinking, feeling, desires, etc.
The cultural descent into 'Brave New World' hedonism has distorted our rational thought. Bankers are giving loans to businesses that think 9,0000 people can support a chic bar with $25 drinks. A freshman in high school would know better.
We have eaten our own heritage, made it so ignoble to be a tradesman, a farmer, a laborer--that anything that hints as that culture must be hidden and the urban elite lifestyle is fetishized to a point that everything is 'chic'--and quickly strip-mall-ish in its effort to not be strip mall-ish.
bsn
“We don’t know what we want until we know what others want, and then we want that.” Excellent observation.
Agreed Brian. We need more rugged individualists willing to eschew "the current thing." They are everywhere. Most of them refused the Covid dogma.
Yeah, I know what you mean. I see it here in Vermont -- where Californians and New Yorkers show up and open a rarely ever actually open "farm stand/yoga studio/latte bar" for a few years and then go out of business. I've been puzzled myself and figured it was: 1) money laundering, 2) witness protection plan, 3) stupidity.
Meanwhile, have you been to Bucees? There's your supply and demand right there.
Bucees 👏🏻
Hell yeah to Bucee's.
Bucee’s has it’s place, but it lacks a certain ambiance…
Yes. To be clear, it has an ambiance, but perhaps not a certain ambiance.
Oh gosh, "farm stand/yoga studio/latte bar" is a perfect description of what's happening in Vermont. And yes, it's out-of-staters who've decided that what rural people really need is another unique restaurant that serves food we've never heard of.
To wit: in the nearby village of Weston (famously home to the Vermont Country Store) there was once a lovely, family kind of inn with a nice, normal, restaurant. The "Inn at Weston" it was called. The owners sold and it's now been turned into "The Weston", owned by some big-city group with a chef from San Fran, making outrageously expensive food that none of the real locals eat. Of course, their target audience are well-heeled people with discriminating tastes from elsewhere - not that we don't already have Big Blue City snobs who live here full-time. Oh, and don't bring your under-12 child, they're not welcome in the astronomically expensive rooms and suites. Wonder how long it will last.
Oops, forgot the link: https://thewestonvt.com/
goodness, that is pricey! "The Art of Relaxation" indeed...lol...Meanwhile, the best food local people can find is whatever they got at the Maplefields.
A lot to think about here; could be the economy is starting to take a toll on peoples ability to go out for entertainment. I noticed here in WA in a business park of probably 25 available spaces 9 were now empty. I also think what use to make towns culture unique was that it was just that, unique. Now the internet dictates the cool and uncool, everybody is offered the same food, the same clothing and shoe choices, the same ladder brands at the "big box stores". We've commercialized everything. I still can not pronounce "charcuterie", lol.
i pronounce it "COLD-cuts" :)
MAJOR difference:
Cold cuts: $5
Charcuterie: $70
That reply needs to be spread far and wide!!! Freaking brilliant!
LOL!
Damn, I never knew. All this time...
lol nymusicdaily ya from Ny / joyseeee
Even all the cars look the same. Everything is ugly.
bsn
As a child of the 70s - early 80s I DESPISE this era of cars.
"Everything is ugly"
Which begs the question - Is "everything ugly" because we, (our society), have moved so far to the left that we can no longer create, or appreciate beauty, OR, have we somehow lost our ability to appreciate, or create beauty, which has caused our cultural shift to the left?
Great question. My gut response: both. We don't have the courage, tenacity, nor patience to create works of great beauty--AND--our 'beauty detection equipment' is malfunctioning due to the dearth of beauty. We're unaccustomed to it. Now it frightens us instead of inspiring...bsn
1) Economic efficiency dictates commonality.
2) Originality occurs in isolation. Communication breeds copying better ideas. (See #1)
Not a defense, just reality.
British gunmakers build the world’s finest rifles & shotguns; they are hand fitted and no parts are interchangeable. Repairs require the weapon to be returned to the UK so a new part can be handmade & fitted.
American & Italian gunmakers manufacture similar weapons using CNC machinery. Parts are 100% interchangeable. I say “similar” b/c while they lack the mystique of the über expensive British guns, the targets observe no difference.
I am told there is a restaurant blood bath happening in Australia and NZ... mortgages rates rent and inflation has sapped discretionary spending... and restaurants are one of the first to get hit
Charcuterie is just a lunchable that went to Harvard.
We curate our okra by hand, round these parts.
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Same thing happening in Canada. Refugees priced out of Toronto trying to make your assembly line Urban Tattooed Lumberjack artisanal-bespoke-craft-farm-to-table smokehouse-eatery-neo-speakeasy work in bombed out-towns like Brantford and Timmins that lost all of their industry decades ago. They only survive due to a local diploma mill "uni" addicted to foreign students, wealthy and connected First Nations honchos, and elderly Boomers sitting on multiple cottages while their grandkids face $3000/mo. rents in Toronto because they can't stand said towns.
This wonderful piece also put me to mind of Isaac Simpson's piece, "There's going to be a war in Montana". The moneyed, Atlantic-reading managerial class is a threat to every community they invade.
I lived in north central Oklahoma for over a decade, and saw several "cocktail bar" kinds of places try and open (Dang it, Bray, why we gotta keep having similar experiences ... ). The suspicion about "blue money" trying to influence these smallish towns feels to me like it's reading too much into the phenomenon. The problem as I saw it was a generational wealth problem. A rising generation of entrepreneurs (note the mentions of GenX coffee shop people and tattoed Millennial bar owners in these comments) are trying to go into business for themselves, having realized that nobody's coming to save them and they're going to have to create their own income stream. But they either don't know how to enter a solid service industry, or "don't want to have a JOB-job," believing there's no fulfillment in doing the 8-5 grind they watched their dad get slowly worn down by. Because they don't precisely know what to do (and/or never acquired a truly marketable job skill) they tend toward influencer-esque business attempts, like cocktail bars and "venues". But the most popular places to eat in the small town where I lived were the longstanding lunch-counter joint that had been open 90 years, and the Mexican family-run place out by the highway, and one of the most celebrated openings in the town's business world was when a local guy hung out a shingle as ... an auto mechanic.
Bottom line, this is supply and demand, right out in the open. The invisible hand of the market will rule, no matter what Instagram tells midwest kids is coastal cool.
Everybody likes good food and drink. The culinary scene in the USA has been improving for decades. On the other hand, you have to have customers and you have to know your customers. Rural Kansas- probably not the place to push avant garde mixology. But every case is unique.The difference between the towns you’ve described is that one has a vital industry at scale and one does not. The oil industry pays well. And contrary to a lot of hype, it’s not going anywhere.
The solution to a lot of this shit politically is less politics, less government, less spending, less sanctimony, less hatred, more freedom and individual responsibility. People can figure out what makes sense for them. The government does a poor job of that and the media is toxic and drives everybody nucking futs. The people who want to be trannies can live in Portland. The oeople who want to be grannies can live in Oklahoma. I don’t care. But we have to shrink the beast that is devouring all of us. Slavery is not all it’s cracked up to be.
The rational solutions you propose have been opposed by half the population since the first hunter brought the first game animal back to the fire and the debate ensued about size of shares and the order in which people got to eat. “You eat what you kill” is the scariest thought in the world to the “takers.”
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“woke Star Wars writ small” - brilliant!
I do accounting in a rural state - starting restaurants/event centers that cater to no one has always been a thing. Usually it is people that grew up in an urban area and have arts or social sciences background. For some reason they want to recreate their liberal ideals in a very conservative area.
Unlike most locals that start businesses they often use grants or other government programs to get started. When a business starts with unearned funds they seem to forget that they need actual customers and virtue signaling alone doesn't pay the bills. They operate for a couple of years and then they fail.
My opinion: a group of people are tired of the urban rat race and romanticize about opening a bar/music venue/coffee shop/restaurant/hand made gift store in a small town. Then the pandemic hits and their house is worth way more than it should be so they cash out to follow their dreams. The state and local gov’ts throw redevelopment money at them and presto, that old building in town gets restored into a new business. There’s a huge grand opening with lights and banners and politicians and reporters.
Then boom, reality hits and after a few months their dream crashes and burns. Those small town people have no interest in organically grown, ecologically transported, sustainably processed $10 cups of coffee. Who knew???
…one’s teenage daughter sighed heavily…? (Pssst, Chris…that’s what they do)
AWARE
Is it as bad as our longed for and well planned overseas family trip to the UK resulting in the backseat occupants - three of the rascals - reading books (this was in the 80's when life was simpler) ALL the while we drove through THE most remarkable historical sites and picture-perfect villages ?? As encouragement to other somewhat disillusioned parents our 'lot' are now all well educated both in life and academia and have instilled a lust for knowledge in all of our seven gorgeous grandchildren....eg the first stop on overseas holidays is always the local museums. They are our secret weapon at quiz nights where we smugly and happily elicit sympathy for having to drag along the kids....So take heart ye with younger offspring.
They *have* to act bored and uninterested. But they absorb it.
Maybe, but three times in the last month or so I've seen family groups in restaurants with one or more of the kids wearing headphones. Zuckerburg et al want them wearing VR goggles from birth.
It is totally different ballgame now for sure ; and a very scary one. Beautifully planned and executed by those behind the scenes that (I refuse to call them "who") are after our very minds as well as bodies.
Great job Grandma and Grandpa.
Thank you.
Willa Cather has thoughts:
we come and go, but the land is always here. And the people who
love it
and understand it are the people who own it-for a little while.
I always wondered what happened to those clowns taking desk spaces in WeWork offices ... drinking free coffee and beer all day long ... and assuming that just being there would lead to a successful business...
Now I know