Small, independently owned businesses are being threatened by the rise of chain stores, by gentrification, and with the lack of protective laws and policies. A force that particularly resonated with me was mentioned in Benediktsson’s “The real small business killer.” The rise of chain stores undoubtedly causes the decline of small businesses, but an important point is that many small businesses close (and others are actually displaced) due to landlords making way for tenants who are willing to pay more for rent. In this case, small business owners aren’t protected by the law. This hits close to home. In Bensonhurst on 86th street, a close family friend owned a bakery, where several of the clients were Russian Jewish and Middle Eastern Jewish residents from the area and others who had moved away but returned because they were loyal customers. Unfortunately, as the bakery’s lease contract was supposed to be renewed, they heard that the landlord had found a more lucrative tenant who was willing to pay nearly three times the rent our friends were paying. With no choice, the bakery packed up and relocated to a different location in Brooklyn, leaving several locals unhappy and perplexed.
This has happened on several occasions in my neighborhood. In some neighborhoods, it may be cause by gentrification and consequently rising residential and commercial prices, rezoning, or simply higher property values caused by various different reasons. Nonetheless, it is absolutely necessary for new laws to grant commercial tenants more power in their negotiations with landlords and protect small business owners from rent extortion, as Benediktsson suggests. I also really have a liking for some of Zuklin’s suggestions for encouraging the growth of small business by providing small business apprenticeships for youth, as well as encouraging and funding city space devoted to these small businesses and those community spaces, called “third places” by Oldenburg, in order to maintain the happiness and stability of a community.
All in all, small businesses and “third places” are what make communities distinct, happy, and stable, and legal policies need to encourage their existence and maintenance.
