Greenwich Village Businesses That Closed In 2017

GREENWICH VILLAGE, NY — After another year of spiraling Manhattan real estate costs, more beloved local businesses have folded.

Over the years, numerous longtime businesses in the Village and other neighborhoods have been forced to shut their doors. A report from state senator Brad Hoylman on small businesses in the area noted disappearances including a 183-year-old pharmacy replaced by a Sweetgreen; a local men's clothing store that gave way to a Verizon retailer; a Foot Locker in the space previously occupied by a Shakespeare & Co. bookstore.

In 2017, some of the businesses that shut their doors included French Roast, the famous 24-hour restaurant and cafe, and Matt Umanov Guitars, which had been a neighborhood staple for nearly half a century.

The cost of real estate in Greenwich Village is so high that some storefronts are simply left empty until landlords can find tenants willing to pay the high asking price. The oft-repeated pattern — local business shuts down after a landlord increases the rent — causes dozens of stores to sit empty in the years before a new retailer moves in. Hoylman's report, released in April, found that nearly one-fifth of storefronts were empty on Bleecker Street in the Village, a situation known as "high-rent blight."

Here are some of the local establishments that closed in 2017:

• French Roast, 78 W 11th St.: French Roast first opened in the Village in 1993. The hybrid cafe-diner-restaurant-bar remained open 24 hours a day for years, before briefly pausing its 24-service in 2015. The restaurant became a Village standby, counting locals, students, celebrities and more as part of its dedicated crowd of regulars. French Roast said it was closing its Village location in July, but did not release details on the decision to close. A location on the Upper West Side remains open. In November, the Mexican restaurant La Contenta announced that it would replace French Roast.
• SushiSamba, 87 Seventh Ave.: SushiSamba, the West Village restaurant made famous by "Sex and the City," closed its last New York location in December. Its Gramercy flagship restaurant on Park Avenue was shuttered in 2014.
• Po, 31 Cornelia St.: The long-time West Village restaurant Po closed its doors in April after 24 years in business. Owner and co-founder Stephen Crane explained that the neighborhood favorite was still seeing a steady stream of customers, but that the money coming in wasn't enough to offset the rent. "When my rent goes up, that's my income. It became to the point where I was making less than the dishwasher," Crane told Patch. "The Village is turning into a ghost town. All the restaurants are closing because the rents are just too high. "
• Good, 89 Greenwich Ave.: Good closed in May after 19 years in the Village thanks to rent increases on its Greenwich Avenue space, according to its chef and owner Steven Picker. "The sad and redundant story of a local business being taken down by a sizable rent increase has become almost a cliche, but one that's absolutely true" Picker said in May
• Matt Umanov Guitars, 237 Bleecker St.: The West Village guitar shop closed this year after nearly 50 years as a New York music institution. Matt Umanov has run his eponymous guitar shop for 48 years in the West Village. He opened the first edition of Umanov Guitars on Bedford Street in 1969 before moving the shop to its last location at 237 Bleecker St. Umanov said he was closing the shop so he could retire. Umanov, who is his own landlord, previously said that his decision to buy the building that houses the music shop helped it to stay open. "It enabled me to stay in business," he said in 2013. "Without buying it, I could never afford the rent."

Image credit: Ciara McCarthy / Patch