Make your way to bright and beautiful El Barrio, where culture seems to just spill off of the streets. Whether it be murals on the sides of buildings, yarn bombings along the trees, or the bright and beautiful people, you can sense that there is just something about this place. No different from any other New York neighborhood, there are locations of large chain corporations all over. However, it appears that it is the small businesses that truly hold up the local economy; small businesses that attach themselves to the local area and form strong bonds with the community. I connected with one such small business owner, Ayala Donchin. Ayala is not originally from El Barrio, nor New York for that matter, but has made a firm home for herself and her business in El Barrio.

From Social Work to Managing Social Life 

Ayala’s journey to El Barrio was not at all a straight path. After obtaining a Masters’ Degree in Social work from the University of Michigan, she moved to New York in 1994 to engage in nonprofit work with middle and alternative high school students. The script flipped to an entirely different kind of social work when she landed a job through a friend as the head of the community relations department of the New York Knicks. After leaving the Knicks, Ayala started running her own consulting firm, which for nine years “oversaw foundations and Community impact programs for athletes, celebrities, and the brands that do business with them,” putting her in constant contact with people in the sports and entertainment industries. This is where were direct journey to El Barrio starts.

“I catered my own 40th birthday party for fun, [a] big party at a beach house in Sag Harbor.” Ayala said. “A friend of a friend who came was a producer at VH1 and asked me to I could do the Craft Services for Hip Hop Honors. This was in September 2009. I thought it was funny that someone wanted to pay me to cook for them. So I accepted the challenge. We fed 1700 over 6 days and walked away with 4 more jobs from VH1, including John Mayer’s Storytellers production.” From here, Ayala began networking through social media with her contacts in the sports and entertainment industries, scoring huge gigs with huge clients such as the NFL and the president of Def Jam Recordings.

Ayala continued taking jobs in this manner for seven more months before making the decision to leave teh corporate world for good and focus her energy full time on this new business, which she named evelyn’s Kitchen. In September 2010, about a year after that first gig with VH1, Evelyn’s Kitchen moved into its East Harlem location, focusing on catering and wholesale baked goods. To help facilitate the transition into this new venture, Ayala participated in Goldman Sachs’ 10,000 Small Businesses program, an initiative launched by the investment firm to empower small business owners with the resources that will help their businesses thrive. After she graduated from the program in 2012, Evelyn’s Kitchen opened its first retail location.

Why are we seeing small businesses in the neighborhood fail? 

Ayala pays homage where it is due, attributing her initial success to her network of friends involved in “the business,” who had sent clients her way and helped with public relations, marketing, and social media. There is no doubt that Ayala truly loves what she is doing now, and there is no reason to ever expect her switching careers again. She insists that to do this kind of work, one must have a passion for it. “You have to be all in,” she asserts. “It is always difficult to start and grow a small business, in the early years and even now, 7 years later. That’s why it’s so important to have a passion for what you do. You have to truly love what you’re doing in order to create a small business that has any chance of success.”

Although Ayala is not native to El Barrio, she has shown her dedication to the area, to truly becoming a part of it. “We opened a second shop in 2015 in midtown. It did get more foot traffic but it had other limitations. We ultimately decided that we want to invest our time and resources in East Harlem and become more integrated into the community as a whole.” Ayala wants to see the area continue to develop and thrive, mentioning that she would love to see more businesses come to the neighborhood.

Small businesses make up 99% of employers in New York State. With the huge stake they play in the economy, you’d think that state and city governments would want to make things as easy as possible on small businesses as a way of supporting the local economy. Yet, small business owners feel like government is against them on this one. On top of higher rents, Manhattan storeowners south of 96th Street are required to pay Commercial Rent Tax if their annual rent is over $250 thousand. “What our city officials don’t understand is small owner-operated retail businesses are working class,” Robert Schwartz, and orthopedic shoe salesman, told NY1. “And there’s just nothing left for us so they’re adding more costs onto us, pushing us closer and closer to going out of business.” The Small Business Congress gave Mayor de Blasio a grade of F on his small business policy. “Mom and Pop have no friends at City Hall,” the group proclaims. The group blames a 20 year old trend of “unchecked real estate speculation.” It is pushing for The Small Business Jobs Survival Act, which would “level the playing field for business owners when negotiating fair lease terms … which would give them a reasonable return on investment.” Other businesses dissolve due to unfortunate circumstances. The MTA’s partial closure of the 103rd Street Subway station that began in May 2015 caused the East Harlem Cafe to lose a significant number of its morning and evening patrons; foot traffic had decreased of foot traffic East Harlem Cafe by 40%, another small business not far from Evelyn’s Kitchen. East Harlem Cafe closed its doors on February 29.

Stepping Back

While managing to stay afloat despite all of the hurdles, expansion proved to be what would threatened the stability of Evelyn’s Kitchen. 2015 had been a big year of business ventures for Ayala. EK launched on QVC in May. A second retail location opened in Gotham West Market in August, and the Fall brought a daily catering commitment with a major television production. Ayala’s story is unique in that her business did not fail because she couldn’t do it. In fact, she was able to do it all. Yet it was all too much. In the midst of all of these expansions, Ayala was also experiencing a major game change in her personal life. She had given birth to her first daughter in March, only six weeks before the QVC launching. She made the decision to scale back. To focus on being the best mother she could be, and to keep EK doing well in what it had been doing all along. She took a couple steps back. Phased out the gotham location. Withdrew from catering commitments.

In planning for the reboot, Ayala and her team decided on a gameplan, and needed the funds to carry it out, so they turned to the community that took them in and supported EK with love and patronage for the past seven years. A GoFundMe page went up on March 15, 2016 detailing EK’s journey and the changes needed to preserve the quality of services put out by EK. With a goal of $15 thousand in 15 days, Ayala pressed the publish button, calling on her community. “It takes a village to raise a small business and we need your help!” And the community pulled through. In droves. If EK’s bond with the community was not apparent before, there was no denying it now. In fourteen days, one day shy of the deadline, the goal was not only met but exceeded. And people kept on giving. The last donation shown on the fundraising page was made a month after the original deadline. That single donation was for $5 thousand.

A Changing Environment

Ayala describes her customers as “people who love great food and goodies.” Although El Barrio’s demographics are changing, Ayala chooses to look at it as more of an opportunity than a hinderance. “We’ve always had a diverse group of customers. East Harlem is changing but it is just more of what has always been here. I think there is diversity in the new neighbors moving in that reflects the existing demographics.” In line with this positive outlook, Ayala chooses to look at the gentrification of El Barrio as motivation to continue providing the best service possible. “I think it is an opportunity. If there is more competition it just means we have to continue to provide excellent service. And it brings more customers for everyone.”

References

Scotto, Michael. “Small Business Owners Struggle to Pay ‘Commercial Rent Tax’ in Manhattan.” New York 1. TWC News, 28 Mar. 2016. Web.

“New York SBDC – Small Business Statistics.” New York SBDC – Small Business Statistics. State University of New York, n.d. Web.

“Michelle Cruz and the East Harlem Café: Nourishing Bodies and Souls – East Harlem Preservation.” East Harlem Preservation. N.p., 24 May 2016. Web.

Donchin, Ayala. “Click Here to Support A New Chapter for Evelyn’s Kitchen by Ayala Donchin.” GoFundMe.com. 15 Mar. 2016. Web.

“Ayala Donchin.” LinkedIn.com. Web.

“Ayala Donchin, Owner of Evelyn’s Kitchen & Architect of the Most Sensational Dishes You’ll Ever Taste.” Evelyn’s Kitchen.