24 THE QUEENS COURIER • NOVEMBER 4, 2021 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM
The Race to Deliver
Bodega and store owners fear grocery delivery apps
BY KIRSTYN BRENDLEN AND
GABRIELE HOLTERMANN
editorial@qns.com
@QNS
Th is is the third story in Schneps Media’s
fi ve-part series examining the proliferation
of grocery delivery services across the city
— and the impact they’re having on residents
and brick-and-mortar business owners
alike.
Quick-commerce grocery delivery services
like JOKR, Gorillas, and Fridge No
More have fl ooded New York City’s market
this year, promising quick delivery
and relatively low prices for everything
from a full week of groceries to a forgotten
dinner ingredient or evening ice
cream purchase.
Where traditional grocery stores shell
out for big pieces of the city’s pricey real
estate to stock thousands of items and
keep the store orderly and well-staff ed,
the apps operate out of “dark stores,” small
warehouses carrying about 2,000 items.
Th e companies say spending less money
on rent and dealing with food waste
allows them to keep their prices low,
about on-par with local grocery stores
for most items, and delivery is free or
low-cost, unlike more established apps
like InstaCart or Fresh
Direct.
Grocery stores aren’t
the only businesses
with something to
worry about. For many
of the city’s nine million
residents, the local corner
store is the go-to for
a quick purchase.
Stocked with the
essentials, more
than 10,000
bodegas serve
their customers
faithfully at all
hours. In some
parts of the city,
bodegas are more
than a quick stop —
they’re the only food store nearby.
While it’s all still new, some grocery
store and bodega owners, still recovering
from months of lockdowns, are concerned
about the disruption.
‘The American Way is done’
“Any bodegas that were in the busy
commercial neighborhoods, they didn’t
do too well,” said Youseff Mubarez, director
of public relations at the Brooklynbased
Yemeni American Merchants
Association. “Rents were high, not a lot of
foot traffi c. But the stores in food deserts,
obviously they did their best to stay open
and get as much product as they can, but
they stayed in business because they were
selling what most people in the neighborhood
need every day.”
Muhammad Esa, who has been in the
retail business for decades, learned the
trade from his father and uncles. He has
owned Farm Shop Deli on 5th Avenue
and 4th Street in Park Slope for twenty
years, and said the apps
aren’t the fi rst threat to business.
Long before the grocery delivery apps,
the business changed when wholesale
operators like Costco and BJ’s became
open to the public.
“So we are just surviving on necessities
that people just need and come and grab,”
Esa said. “We’re not really, like, maybe 30
years ago, when we used to be just like a
supermarket, we buy wholesale, we buy
just like a supermarket. Th en things started
to change when the wholesale became
available to the public.”
Small businesses don’t stand a chance
against corporations like Costco or Whole
Foods, he feels, because corporations
have too much infl uence over politicians,
which has chipped away on regulations
that protected small business owners in
the past.
“Th e American Way is done,” Esa said.
“It’s just a thing of the past.”
Jose Bello, a Washington Heights native
and founder of My Bodega Online, was
Green Ivy Organic off ers a large variety of produce, fresh fl owers, and
grocery items.
e n c o u r - aged by the city’s decision
to cap marketing
and delivery fees
apps like Uber Eats
and DoorDash
can charge restaurants
— but feels it’s
unlikely regulations
are in the works for
new apps.
“Th is half a billion dollar
industry was created in
the last 18 months,” he said. “By
the time that people realize the eff ect that
they may or may not have —maybe either
they burst as a bubble, or they take over
everything — it’s too late, they are here.”
Mubarez said more hardship is coming
for bodega owners and their employees as
emergency grants run dry and the unemployment
payments that were allowing
customers to spend their money stop.
“Right now, all the businesses are like,
‘I’m making 25, 30 percent less than I was
making last month, it’s getting tougher to
stay open, and stuff like that,” Mubarez
said. “It’s just the worst timing for lower
income communities, they’re getting
less money, and then, you know, the more
affl uent people like landlords are saying,
‘Oh, it’s time to raise rent again, everything
is back to normal.’ It’s just widening
the gap.”
The potential to adapt
Bello launched My Bodega Online, a
delivery platform for bodegas, last year.
Many were already delivering informally,
he said, when customers would call up
wanting something and they’d send out
Photos by Gabriele Holtermann
an employee who wasn’t busy on a bike
or e-bike.
Th e app makes ordering and delivering
easier and more effi cient for bodegas
and their customers, and makes the
process a little more offi cial for customers
who might not be used to calling up to
place an order.
Adapting to the new reality and keeping
up with technology is critical if bodegas
want to stay competitive, Bello said.
“Th ey are so big,” he said of the new
delivery services. “Bodegas are not seeing
what is coming. Because they’re going
to, if not destroy, they’re going to modify
the bodegas. Bodegas, if they don’t disappear,
they will be kind of the daily sandwich
kind of thing, you go to buy lottos,
that kind of thing, but the grocery part
will not be as strong there.”
Ten years ago, Bello said, taxi services
— not just yellow cabs, but private companies
who riders would call when they
needed a ride — were an integral part
of the fabric of New York City, a longtime
and iconic part of its streets. But the
advent of cheaper ride-hailing apps like
Uber and Lyft turned that upside down.
“Th ey had capital, they were the famous
people in our parades, they were on every
corner of the city,” he said. “And they disappeared.
Th ere are a few here and there,
they’ve even tried putting out an app, but
they kind of disappeared in the infl uence,
in the numbers, and we all use Uber or
Lyft .”
“Th at is coming, it’s upon us.”
Members of the New York Taxi Workers
Alliance have been gathering outside City
Hall every day since September, protest-
A Buyk courier delivers
groceries in the Village.
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