Small business owners are still struggling in New York

Good morning. It’s Friday. We’ll take a look at how small businesses are holding up as the city struggles to recover from the pandemic. We’ll be kayaking with a congressional candidate who is one of more than a dozen Democrats running in the Aug. 23 primary in just one district. And speaking of primary, today is the last day to register to vote in it.

Kymme Williams-Davis opened a coffee shop in Brooklyn called Bushwick Grind in 2015. She spent $200,000 renovating the space she rented and added a kitchen. She specialized in coffee produced from beans that were roasted instead of fair trade.

Bushwick Grind did well until the pandemic hit and the store had to close for nine months.

But as my colleague Lydia DePillis wrote , running a small business hasn’t gotten any easier since the Bushwick Grind reopened. Foot traffic has not yet recovered. Williams-Davis’ expenses for coffee and other ingredients have skyrocketed, in part because the upstate New York farmers she depends on are saving on gas by driving less often into the city.

And enough employees have quit to add another complication to the demands of trying to operate at full capacity.

All of this has left him uncertain about Bushwick Grind’s future and chances of survival. “I feel like it’s 50-50,” she said, “because if I don’t find a way to reduce my liability and keep the equity, I’m not going to be able to extend that amount.”

Williams-Davis’ concerns are widespread. The nonprofit Small Business Majority, in a survey this month, found that almost one in three small businesses could not survive without additional capital or a change in business conditions. That finding was echoed in a survey by Alignable, a social network for small business owners, which found that 43 percent of small businesses in New York were at risk of closing in the fall, up 12 percentage points from a year ago. seen.

Alignable’s Chuck Casto blamed erratic return-to-work policies that have left many Manhattan offices empty and nearby small businesses hurting. About 41 percent of small businesses in New York could not pay their rent in full or on time in July, according to Alignable. This was seven percentage points more than last month. Only Massachusetts had a higher delinquency rate, and only by one percentage point.

During the shutdown, Williams-Davis covered rent by subletting the space, and she contracted to provide 400 meals a day at the city’s vaccination sites when it reopened. The deal gave her the cash flow to qualify for a loan so she could buy her space.

But it is no closer to closing a deal. It has been outbid more than once by investors with deeper pockets.

This week the city announced a $1.5 million commitment to continue a public and private small business outreach network that was established during the pandemic. The idea was to provide, among other things, legal and technical assistance.

“The hardest thing is this transition to a digital economy,” said Kathryn Wylde, president of the Partnership for New York City, an influential business group that started the network, “because these are mostly brick-and-mortar businesses that haven’t a sophisticated online presence or marketing capacity.”

Kat Lloyd had much the same idea when she and a partner started a small business to do digital marketing for small businesses. Now, she said, “everyone else is struggling, so we’re struggling.”

“I can’t hire more people to do the work I need — I have to focus on the bottom line,” said Lloyd, who like Williams-Davis is in Bushwick. “Every day for several months, I woke up with this ball in my throat and a pit in my stomach about how I was going to pay my landlord while making sure my customers were taken care of.”

weather

Expect a partly sunny day with highs in the 80s, with a chance for afternoon thunderstorms. Rain could continue into the evening, with temperatures dropping into the 70s.

ALTERNATE SIDE PARKING

Valid until August 15 (Lady Day).

Latest New York News

Elizabeth Holtzman broke glass ceilings and voted to impeach Richard Nixon when she was a congresswoman in the 1970s. Now she’s running again, in a crowded primary field in the 10th Congressional District in Brooklyn and Manhattan. My colleague Nicholas Fandos not only interviewed him; he went kayaking with her. Here’s how he says it happened:

Years ago, someone Elizabeth Holtzman didn’t know died and left modest bequests to her and two other pioneering congresswomen from New York, Bella Abzug and Shirley Chisholm.

Holtzman, who was once the youngest woman elected to Congress, spent the money on a kayak, a dark green Walden that she uses in the summer to paddle around the Peconic River on eastern Long Island, where she often spends weekends.

So when I first asked Holtzman this spring about her unusual decision to come out of a long political retirement and run for Congress at age 80, she suggested that maybe we should throw water.

As a political reporter, I’ve walked with candidates as they greeted voters outside supermarkets, at restaurants and at parades. I shared plates of Mississippi ribs with a former cabinet secretary running in the Deep South. I even spent an afternoon in northern Montana with Senator Jon Tester as he tried to fix a grain elevator, a large piece of farm equipment used to move his crops. But never before had a politician asked me to kayak.

I’m no kayak expert, but of course I said yes to Holtzman.

We agreed to meet at Pier 2 in Brooklyn Bridge Park on a crisp summer evening earlier this month. We rented kayaks, snapped on our life jackets, and headed for a protected stretch of water just outside Brooklyn’s waterfront. The Brooklyn Bridge sailed over us. The skyline of the financial district rose across the East River and it was a magical moment when the Statue of Liberty appeared across the harbor.

Back on dry land shortly after, she spoke about deciding to enter the race because she was outraged by the leaked draft of the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade. “I told myself, you know, I don’t have to sit on the sidelines,” she told me.

If she wins, half a century after she first set the record, Holtzman would be perhaps the oldest non-serving president ever elected to Congress. She’s no stranger to long shots and record-breaking campaigns: Her 1972 victory came against Emanuel Celler, a 50-year-old incumbent backed by the Brooklyn Democratic machine. Later, she was the first (and still only) woman to be elected district attorney in Brooklyn and New York City. (She was almost New York’s first female senator, but lost to Alfonse D’Amato in 1980 in a close race.)

Before returning to Pier 2, we also talked about her family, the Jewish immigrants who fled Russia and arrived at Ellis Island; for her work for Mayor John Lindsay; for improving conditions in the East River; and about the best kayaking spots around New York.

Ms. Holtzman is well aware that, in a summer when Democrats worry about the age of President Biden and other Democratic leaders in Washington, there are concerns about her age. In the interview, she insisted that she was as powerful as ever. I asked her if she was tired at all — a term she used to describe Celler in her first campaign.

“You answer that question,” she said with a laugh, adding at the end, “I’m not tired. I’m not tired at all.”

Dear Diary:

A friend and I were walking along East 86th Street on a beautiful spring afternoon. She was describing two outfits and asking for my opinion on which one to wear to a fancy corporate dinner that evening.

I was considering her choices when we heard a voice: “Put on the velvet jacket and silk trousers.”

Looking to our right, we saw a young woman pushing a baby carriage. Since we couldn’t decide which option was best, my friend took her own advice.

– Marilyn Hillman

Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Submit submissions here AND read more Metropolitan Journal here.

I’m glad we could gather here. See you on Monday. – JB

PS Here’s today’s Mini crossword AND Spelling Bee. Here you can find all our puzzles.

Walker Clermont AND Ed Shanahan contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at nytoday@nytimes.com.

Sign up here to receive this newsletter in your inbox.