NYC college neighborhood businesses
eagerly await return of students
BY ARIA VELAZQUEZ
THE CITY
Back-to-school sales have
never been so crucial.
While virtual learning
kept students and staff at the
city’s colleges safely apart, the
separation also took a toll on
nearby retailers that relied on an
economic boost at the beginning
of every semester and foot traffi c
throughout the school year.
Now some of those business
owners say their hopes to make
it out of the pandemic with some
degree of fi nancial stability are
riding on an academic return to
normal — even as COVID stubbornly
refuses to disappear.
Since March 2020, the Book
Culture store on Broadway and
West 114th Street, near Columbia
University, has been far quieter
than the staff would have liked.
“We’ve always had very busy
stores,” said store manager Cody
Madsen said, referring to Book
Culture’s two locations in Morningside
Heights and one in Long
Island City, Queens.
That foot traffic dwindled
during the pandemic. In 2020,
“Something like 40% of our sales
A Book Culture outpost on Broadway at W. 114th Street, near
Columbia University.
were online,” Madsen said. “Now
it’s kind of leveled out to around
15% online.”
It Takes The Village
For Deep Patel and Karn
Deshmukh, an infl ux of NYU
students is crucial for their new
restaurant to gain traction. The
two 28-year-olds from Jersey City
co-own Ambo, a quick-service
Indian restaurant similar to
Chipotle on East 8th Street near
Washington Square Park.
The partners selected the location
for Ambo, which opened
ARIA VELAZQUEZ/THE CITY
earlier this summer, with hopes it
would attract a mix of Greenwich
Village residents, local retail and
offi ce workers — and NYU’s tens
of thousands of students and staff.
“So far, our customer base is
mostly residential and offi ce workers,”
Patel said. “But we defi nitely
expect to see an uptick in business
when students come back.”
“The student influx just
started, but we haven’t seen a lot
yet,” Deshmukh added.
Ramaz Kiknadze, the owner of
Cafe Delia, a 4-month-old Georgian
restaurant a few doors down
on East 8th, is similarly hopeful.
“We’re seeing 70% to 80%
residential customers for now, but
in September that could change,”
Kiknadze said. “Students could
be 50% of our customers.”
Kiknadze plans on using
university-specific marketing
tools to attract college kids to
the fl edgling restaurant, like advertising
in the Campus Clipper
and offering a 20% off to NYU
students and staff.
“I hope that the situation isn’t
going to change and nothing
terrible happens with COVID,”
Kiknadze said. “We need time to
establish ourselves.”
Rachel Brandon, the marketing
and events manager for the
Village Alliance, the business
improvement district that encompasses
NYU and The New School,
emphasized the importance of
students to the neighborhood’s
economic vitality.
“August can be a little empty
because the residents are gone,”
Brandon said. “Then this is the
funny period where there’s not
really summer school and we’re
waiting on that ‘after Labor
Day’ state for students to come
back.”
A New Economy
The pandemic has changed behavior,
so the return to in-person
instruction may not translate into
a full return to in-person shopping,
some observers say.
“I think most students will
continue to do their shopping
online,” said Dan O’Flaherty, an
economics professor at Columbia.
Still, local businesses “will do
better than they did last year,” he
predicted.
What the city’s overall economic
picture will look like in
even a few months or what kind of
purchasing power young people
will have this semester remains
to be seen.
“On the one hand, there’s still a
lot of unemployment,” O’Flaherty
said. “But the student-age job
market has been OK.”
That could be a positive signal
for student spending at nearby
businesses. But other factors from
the evolving COVID variants to the
weather will play a part. The key,
merchants say, is to be prepared for
the unexpected.
“If anything, we’ve learned
in the last two years that we’re
pretty dexterous,” said Madsen,
the bookstore manager.
This article was originally
published on Aug. 30 at 8:14
p.m. EDT by THE CITY, an independent,
nonprofit news outlet
dedicated to hard-hitting reporting
that serves the people of New York.
De Blasio goes for a spin on Times Square ferris wheel
BY DEAN MOSES
Just call him the mayor of Fun City 2.0.
Mayor Bill de Blasio was spinning
heads on Aug. 31 as he took to the sky
riding the Times Square Ferris Wheel in order
to help promote the Big Apple’s cultural
comeback from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The 110-foot-tall Ferris Wheel has been
rotating on Broadway and 48th Street since
Aug. 25 and is being touted as an instrument
through which to liven the heart of
the New York once again with tourists and
city dwellers alike.
The mayor arrived with his son, Dante,
on Tuesday afternoon to showcase the big
wheel’s safety in hopes of enticing leagues
of visitors to Times Square.
Grinning from ear to ear, de Blasio
climbed aboard an empty carriage alongside
Dante, New York City Council Member
Keith Powers, and President of the Times
Square Alliance Tom Harris, where they
were swiftly whisked into the sky. Peering
The mayor gives a big wave from the big wheel on Aug. 31.
down at the city, the mayor gave a hearty
wave to those far below.
“This is a really amazing feeling — you
are fl oating above Times Square. It’s like
PHOTO BY DEAN MOSES
I’ve never had an experience like this in my
whole life. Times Square is the crossroads
of the world, and you are up there just fl oating.
It is amazing, it is worth it. Whether
you are a visitor, or a New Yorker, come
on down and experience this. It’s only for
a limited time,” de Blasio said afterward.
Quick to point out that the Ferris wheel
will only be available to ride through Sept.
12, de Blasio added that September will
also see the return of Broadway shows.
“Times Square is coming back. You can
see the energy. You can see the activity,”
de Blasio said, pointing out the return
of restaurants, retail businesses, and
entertainment before continuing, “We
know next month Broadway comes back
and Times Square is going to be hoping
again.”
The mayor also continued to speak about
the importance of vaccinations, which he
credits for allowing the wheel to be erected
in the fi rst place.
“The key to our comeback has been
vaccination. One of our best vaccination
centers is right here at 20 Times Square,”
de Blasio said, adding “This Ferris wheel
is helping us with the vaccination drive.”
4 September 2, 2021 Schneps Media