Stepping inside the storefront at 3270 24th St., it’s not immediately clear what kind of business it is. The space holds two retail outlets, plus a lawyer and an electronics repairman.
This may sound like a “man walks into a bar” joke, but it’s not — it’s the business model for many Latino business owners in the Mission.
“We help each other with rent,” said Binda Cano, the owner of Binda’s Boutique and holder of the lease at 3270 24th St. She added that the tenants might be looking for a fifth business to join them in their three-week-old venture.
They aren’t the only ones. As Latino-owned businesses that cater to Latinos struggle to survive in a neighborhood with rising commercial rents, many have taken to sharing space. Cano declined to say how much her rent is, but did say it is substantial because of the large space.
“This is the only way to hold it together,” Cano said.
And she should know. This is the third time in as many years that she’s moved her boutique to similar storefronts. A Guatemalan immigrant who lives in San Mateo, Cano began selling clothes through a catalog. Before she moved to 24th Street, she rented space with others first on 19th Street, then on 16th Street.
“I chose 24th Street because everything is here — the bus, the BART, cheap food,” she said.
There is no official signage on the shared storefront, just advertisements announcing the tenants’ services and a sign in Spanish soliciting another small business. The electronics repair business has a counter set up across from Cano’s boutique space. Next to that is the lawyer, who works from a small desk. The owner of the electronics repair shop, who declined to be named, moved from another shared space just down the street.
“We needed more space,” said one of the employees.
This is all part of the journey, Cano said. The destination: her own storefront in the Mission, a meeting place for Latinos throughout the Bay Area.
With only 39 percent of the population, Latinos are no longer the majority in the Mission, according to 2010 Census figures. But they still come to the neighborhood from all over the Bay Area, many because a part of their life is still here. They come to the churches, medical offices, restaurants and nonprofit service providers, said Dairo Romero of the Mission Economic Development Agency (MEDA).
When MEDA offered free tax help to low-income residents, Romero helped many people from the East Bay, he said, from as far away as Pittsburg and Bay Point.
Romero has been working with small businesses on Mission and 24th streets for the better part of the last five years, and he’s seen successes and failures.
In 2010, MEDA opened a small business incubator next to its headquarters on 19th and Mission streets, called El Mercadito. Up to nine business pay between $250 to $1,200 for a sliver of space in which to build their customer base.
“It is an alternative way to start your own businesses,” Romero said.
Patricia Torres opened her shop Mystical Collections, which sells holistic and new age products, at El Mercadito in 2010. Earlier this month she had a grand opening at her new location, 3196 24th St.
Torres was the first to move her business out of the incubator. Since moving to 24th Street, her sales have doubled, and she was able to hire a full-time employee, according to MEDA’s newsletter.
Carmina Gonzales, who opened a gift shop called Wrap Your Dreams at El Mercadito, hopes to emulate Torres’ success. Like Cano, she initially sold merchandise out of catalogs — in her case it was makeup — and like Cano and many other women entrepreneurs in the Mission, she is a graduate of the the Women’s Initiative’s Alas program, which is partially funded by the U.S. Small Business Administration.
Gonzalez said that sharing rental space with others requires negotiation. One of the tenants at the market couldn’t get along with the others and was asked to move, she said.
Gonzalez hopes to open her own store eventually, but right now that goal seems a bit far away, as her sales are down. She blames it on the economy and on the reduction in foot traffic along Mission Street since Muni began rerouting buses while the street is repaired.
Not all are as lucky as Torres. The Wholesale Fashion Shoe store on Mission Street, which was not part of MEDA’s incubator project, closed after little more than a year in business.
Cano has advised a friend who opened a flower store in the neighborhood just three months ago to rent to other businesses.
“One wants to succeed, but you also have to be realistic,” she said. “It’s not possible for businesses to make it on their own.”
I swear I read this exact same article in the mid-90s.
Places like Wise Sons, Medjool, Foreign Cinema & the like upgrade a neighbhorhood. They are good neighbors & build the community into something to be proud of. Remember Valencia St when you wouldn’t even want to be there in the daytime let alone out at night. Now you can be there pretty much any time of day. The businesses there are successful, business is good, & none are schlock shops which is what most of the businesses on Mission St comprise. Can you really take an attorney seriously who shares space with a schlock shop. Years ago there was a butcher who shared space with a sleazy lingerie shop. The place was a filthy mess. Walked out when 2 guys walked in with their pitbulls. Now that space is a high-end eyeglass business which has been there for at least 10 yrs now. Clearly a change for the better. If you can’t afford the going rate for rent & have to share space to make any kind of money, maybe these people need to find another line of work. Now if only realtors can get the new techies coming into the city to buy property in District 9. Vast improvement.
These people is what used to make the Mission diverse. I grew up in the neighborhood.
Valencia even at night is dangerous, who are you kidding? All the bars on Valenica yeah right.
Rent is crazy and only for those who have some money, how is this diverse? Tech companies and others business get seed money and/or loans from banks. Mission business do not get seed money or even support from the community. How about creating and supporting those who have an idea into something tanglible. This is how you create; Why can’t business support one another? Have joint ventures or classes on how to be substainble. The Mission has become one sided, eltist, supporting their own kind of people(techies or tech like). Coming into blocks destroying what made this a soulful community; now the playground of the rich to eat a burrito, expensive coffee and bars. Walking adverstiment of sameness.
The mission as an interesting neighborhood for working people has long been over and the first wave of gentrification (hipsters) will peter out in the next 2-3 years.
That’s when the 2nd wave of gentrification, mostly yunnies and 6 figure professionals will come in by force, it will be a trickle at first (it’s already well under way)then before you know it the hipsters will be replaced by people with what I would best describe as a suburban/brooks brothers fashion sense and sensibilty.
Then of course the victorious will rewrite history as they always do and say they saved the mission from crackheads, drug dealers, gang members, vacant storefronts and if not for them the neighborhood would have been a wasteland.
Last few years I have been noticing that Oakland is in play and will be the next working/lower income/non white community to be plundered and raped.Of course we will all be told that this is good for us, the art going up in the nabe is life changing, although we could no longer afford the rent, all the new establishments only hire people that look ike them, we are unwelcome and the employees feel awkward when a local goes into there establishments, I could go on and on.
America is well on its way to destroying itself from within with it’s full throttle consumption culture and it’s catering only to the rich.
@ Sammy 71, you are right about the second wave of 6 figure salaries. but it is already happening.
just walk down valencia on any night and that is exactly who is spilling onto the street and showing up in taxis. the hipsters that made the mission scene, dont make 6 figures and dont take taxis.
the way i see it the young hipsters on fixies and toms shoes, hung out and lived in the mission because they liked it the way it was…the soul. they added to the missions diversity without destroying it. many of them are artisits, work for non profits and are community based people.
but now there is corporate money, ie: tacolicious yes a gourmet taqueria in the mission is the second location the first being the marina. these aren’t pull yourself up by the bootstrap folks, this is venture capitol by big players.
yes the irony is that when they have all moved in and there are no more latino businesses and the rents aren’t at all affordable, there go the artists and thinkers that made the mission the mission. then it will be the marina, pacific heights where people just rally around wealth and luxery. and they will try and find another place that makes them feel alive, when they see interesting people hanging out somewhere else.
nothing more entertaining than seeing 4 guys stumble out of a taxi, all wearing their own version of hipster would wear. look closely, you might still see the tag of the brand new jeans.
in the end, i now choose to support businesses that fit in the community. i love pastrami, but i get my fix at tommies joint and say, “thanks but no thanks” to wise sons deli. i am an east coast transplant and love bagels, but i wont give shmendricks $17 dollars for a 1/2 dozen bagels. i just savor the bagels i have when i visit family or go to katz bagles on 16th.
am i going to shut down wise sons by this action?…no. but maybe they will realize that their neighbors aren’t eating in thier restaurant.
i cant believe i am saying this, but thankfully for the welfare hotels and the bart stations… mission street is safe for now. when the city does something about that, all people of color will be moves omewhere else.
Does this really surprise anyone? It’s a hipster kind of neighborhood, and that not that bad. I’ve been here 20 years, if you’re not with the program, that’s business.
So sad….Latino business owners need to share rent and Wise Sons Deli has a line out the door. The Marina needs a Jewish deli, not 24th St. It’s like these business owners aren’t just happy to succeed but that want hipster street credit. A place like Wise Sons would succeed anywhere in SF, but now that are juast raking in the money with what I am sure they feel is low rent on 24th St. Hipster businesses, the new corporations ie: never enough profit.
Wow, the Mission not having Latinos.Well then it is no longer should be called the Mission. How boring once when there was diversity now all the same. How sad.
Diversity means many different cultures. All Latino does not mean diverse.
But it’s not diversity if it’s the same old vanilla yuppie “hipsters”