The business I would like to focus on is The Staten Island Culture Lounge. I walk past this place everyday but have never stepped foot inside. I’ve always wondered what occupied this space but most times I’m passing by is in a rush to get on the ferry. The culture lounge is the Country’s only artist space inside a commuter area, as it is located in the St. George Ferry terminal in New Brighton. After doing some reading about the business, it seems like an interesting and positive place. The culture lounge features exhibits from visual artists, poets, musicians, writers and performers. Not only does it provide a platform for local artist to showcase their talents, it allows them to sell their original work and make a profit. I think it will be interesting to do a story on what the inspiration was for starting this business. Also what the atmosphere is like working there.
Business Profile Proposal: Challenge Escape Rooms
I’ve decided to do a profile on Challenge Escape Rooms, a small business on Bell Boulevard, Bayside.
Challenge Escape Rooms opened on June 19 of this year. The only articles I’ve found about this business are articles in the Queens Courier and the Times Ledger, and both of them are simply articles about the business’ premise and the fact that it’s opening/open.
Challenge Escape Rooms is a company that provides an interactive game experience. The player, and up to nine companions, will be locked in a themed room for one hour and will have to use clues and work together to solve puzzles in order to escape. Participants can choose between two themes: “The Virus,” in which players have to find the cure for a deadly virus and escape a quarantined lab, and “The Unsolved Case,” in which players have to find documents vital to a criminal court case and escape before being caught. In honor of Halloween, “The Unsolved Case” has been replaced with “Killer Countdown”—in which players must escape a kidnapper—for the month of October.
I chose Challenge Escape Rooms because it’s very unique, as a business and in its location. Bell Boulevard is a commercial hub, but it’s primarily home to restaurants and traditional retail businesses. To my knowledge, Challenge Escape Rooms is the first business of its kind on the street, which I think will make it an interesting business to profile.
Neighborhood Profile: Lemon remains King in Corona, Queens
The famous ice shop in Corona, Lemon Ice King, has been around since 1964, a time when the area was pre-dominantly Italian. Pete Benfaremo and his father Nicola were its original owners and Vincent Barbaccia, a teenager, was employed behind the counter, serving customers in a traditional uniform: white tee-shirt draped over white pants and a white apron branded by the ice shop’s logo. Barbaccia assisted Benfaremo for some time before beginning to help manage the business and develop other assistants, most notably Michael Zampino.
“We were selling lemon, pistachio and orange. More typical in an Italian taste” said Barbaccia, co-owner of the shop since buying the business from the Benfaremo family in 1993 with Zampino.
Today in Corona, the population has nearly doubled since the 1960’s and race in the community has changed significantly. The area is recognized for being pre-dominantly Hispanic. Statistics from the 2010 census reveal that approximately 74 percent of the community identified themselves as Hispanic or Latino.
Local residents are no longer playing bocce at William F. Moore park on 108tth Street, across from the ice shop. Summers still host older residents on special occasions, gathering together the older Italian community with games of bocce and heated conversations about the Mets. These nights at park, nicknamed “Spaghetti”, bring peak business production for Lemon Ice King, but around the community, one will find more Colombian bakeries and Dominican diners than they will Italian cuisines.
In the business for over 30 years, Vincent Barbaccia wants to keep the shop authentic to it’s “King” Pete Benfaremo. The gold plate is an original installation, lighting up Corona till 11pm.
The influx of immigrants has translated into a bevy of small businesses in Corona, Queens. Nail salons, wax and thread spas, pizzerias, and barbershops repeated for blocks by different owners yet no business is as specific to a season like that of Mr. Zampino and Mr. Barbaccia. Nonetheless, they offer their authentic Italian desert all year.
For $1.50, customers are granted a scoop of ice, blended with a choice of over 50 flavors, all blended with natural products. Numerous Corona natives admitted to having it as routine as their coffee in the morning.
It has become a landmark in Corona, whether customers are cluttered together after a Mets game on a Sunday evening or parked during the winter months when Barbaccia, Zampino and their team of teenagers dig a trail through the snow for customers to go and make orders at the stand.
Behind the counter, a crop of teenagers no longer dress in traditional apparel, wearing washed-out slim fitting jeans and a t-shirt with the Benfaremo logo, finished off with a baseball cap, sometimes flipped backwards. They still offer service with the same gratitude and are forbidden by the soul of Pete to mix any ice flavors. Nonetheless, customers around the neighborhood love their ices. Adriano Santos, a resident around the neighborhood and a regular at the shop admits that the people working anticipate he is going to order a small lime ice upon arrival. Swearing to Lemon Ice King’s consistent measures to know their clients, Santos said “There is no other place with gourmet ices like this. My grandmother’s flan is the only thing I know that is as good.”
Lemon Ice King is all about maintaining a classic tradition of preparation, routine and delivery; however, they are attuned to the community changes and continue to make different flavors to accommodate them.
Barbaccia and Zampino continue the tradition to hire teens within the community. While there are now a culmination of ethnicities living in the area, these business owners look for respect and good attitude from the teenagers they hire.
Understanding that not all households have parents supportive of the children living in them, Barabaccia likes parents who are actively involved in their child’s work schedule. “You can tell by the respect that these kids have and how they act, the kind of home they are coming from” said Barbaccia. It is a bias he carries from his own experience of being hired at the Lemon Ice King.
Barbaccia admits that the changing community affected his business for a small period of time. According to the city-data statistics, the median household income in Corona is $46,493, putting them below the average household income of New York city. Moreover, these statistics do not take into account the illegal immigrants living in these households. Many residents of the Sherwood apartment complexes know this situation too well. One resident, who wished to remain anonymous, admitted that she has three undocumented people living under her apartment. During bi-annual checkups, she has them stay elsewhere for a week to avoid suspicious activity and keep her rent under control.
Ice carts, often run by Hispanic immigrants who fill the streets of Corona, offer a similar product to Lemon Ice King for a cheaper price. They are famous for carving out ice from their cart and saturating it with concentrated flavors for a lesser price. Many local residents were intrigued by the price for a while.
“We see the change in the past years where they would patronize those carts because they were cheaper but now they realize the quality of our product. For that extra 50 cents or a quarter, they’re getting a choice of 50 flavors. For under 10 dollars you get something for you and the kids,” said Barbaccia.
During the Holiday season, Lemon Ice King stays open, offering their delights and getting into the spirit.
The product is unmatched indeed. All the ices are water-based and made with real fruit. In addition, the business always packs a surplus of ingredients they provide everything on their menu at all times. “We run out of nothing.” says Barbaccia.
In addition, the business continues to increase their menu to accommodate the taste of the community.
“The way the flavor of the neighborhood has changed reflects in the ices that we sell now. We’re selling more tropical flavors. More mango, coconut and piña colada” said Mr. Barbaccia.
Last year, the business introduced an Oreo-cookie and a root beer flavor. Mr. Barbaccia hints that a tropical delight and a tamarind flavored ice are in the works at the request of his customers.
The business has not experienced a drastic change in sales. The bigger challenge the business faces is maintaining the original recipe. Matching a color pigment that has been around for 70 years has proven more difficult for the business than losing any clientele.
The aesthetic of the store strikes the resemblance of the original stand. The pinstripe awning extends itself as shade for customers dripping ice on their hands in the peak of the summer. The gold plate hanging above the storefront is an original installation from when Lemon Ice King first planted themselves in the heart of Corona, shining the number of flavors that increases every couple of years and the Benfaremo logo. Instead of selling themselves short by fixing the crack on the floor or by maximizing their profits by using top line puree over their fruits, the business has stuck to Pete Benfaremo’s script: natural fruit in their ices that are never to be mixed.
“I don’t care if we sell pistachio or chocolate as long as someone is buying it,” said Mr. Barbaccia.
“Small Town Man, Big Time Job”
The business has been around for 80 years and the building was recently renovated in 2012.
The building’s awning reads, “Buckley’s Drug Store and Compounding Center.” Customers enter an old-fashioned pharmacy owned by a man who greets them by name and asks about their day. Puzzled by the word compounding, they learn their medications are made from scratch to tailor their needs. The store, on the tree-lined streets of Englewood, New Jersey, reflects the charm of a family owned business and specialized medication.
A bell rings to signal your arrival when you open the door. Gil Dominguez can be seen filling patient’s prescriptions with sounds of pounding, conversation, and old school music filling the air.
For the last 30 years, 10 hours a day, Mr. Dominguez has successfully run Buckley’s, on Palisades Avenue, with his own personal touch despite the difficulties he faces.
Dominguez is always seen in his white lab coat and smiling at customers.
From childhood, he has been surrounded by the world of medicine, following in the footsteps of his aunt and father-in-law who owned a pharmacy in Cuba. His father, struggling to pave the way for a prosperous life for his children, embarked on a journey to fulfill his family’s dreams.
“I grew up watching my aunt work and one day I started to ask questions,” he said. “I saw all the great things she could do for her patients and I knew I wanted to do something with a professional license in a business environment.”
With that dream, Dominguez worked in a number of pharmaceutical firms and hospitals until he acquired Buckley’s, where he works with his wife and son. Passing down family values, Dominguez said he hopes “we can be here for another 30 plus years.”
Mixing family with business has presented several challenges in his struggle to survive and remain current.
“My wife takes care of the gift shop and social media publicity while my son assists with compounding medications and patient care,” he said. “Families fight but we only get stronger.”
The key to Dominguez’s success is how he serves his customers in ways chain pharmacies such as Walgreens or the CVS down the street cannot. Although 41 percent of Americans buy their prescriptions at chain stores according to ConsumerReports.org, Dominguez builds his business by accommodating patient’s needs, schedules, and requests, creating an intimate atmosphere not possible among chain stores. In an age where humans are numbers on a computer, or voice-acted recordings, customers appreciate that Dominguez remembers their face and medical history.
“This industry has to be personalized,” he said. People don’t just come to your store because it’s a pharmacy, they come because they have a trust.”
A loyal customer and Englewood resident, Annette Amirian, has been going to Buckley’s for 12 years. She relies on Dominguez to provide her family with prescriptions in a timely fashion.
She said, “I go to Gil because I believe he monitors what types of medications I’m taking and truly cares for my well-being.”
This relationship between patient and pharmacist does not just exist within the Buckley’s building. Dominguez admits to seeing a lot of his customers at the local grocery store down the street.
Dominguez crushing pills to compound medications.
“Englewood is a close community,” he said. “When I go pick up some milk, it will take me 15 minutes because I bump into patients and start talking.”
Dominguez’s goal is simple: to please patients and monitor their care. Buckley’s specializes in compounding medications to fit patient’s needs in the lab on the second floor. If a patient can’t take an oral medication, he looks for an alternative such as a cream or a suppository to be taken.
A highlight of his job is when Dominguez is able to help someone get a medication that the insurance company refuses to pay for. “Although it is not simple to override a medication that the insurance company didn’t cover,” he said. “When I can, I know I’ve done something good for my patient.”
Dominguez takes the good with the bad as he finds himself struggling with today’s technological advancements that have caused a decline in sales due to online mail orders. Certain prescriptions have a rider available through mail order for maintenance drugs such as blood pressure, asthma, or diabetes medications that can only be filled through a PBM, a pharmacy benefit manager. The idea is to get people to use lower cost mail order services instead of having prescriptions filled at their local drugstores.
“Over the last 15 years, I would say I lost a lot of customers because of this,” he said. “Let’s say a family of four uses mail orders, that’s four patients that I’ve lost.”
His problems all “come down to dollars and cents.” About 10-15 times a day, Dominguez calls insurance companies to make sure he was reimbursed when he was supposed to or calls to receive a prior authorization from a doctor to cover a prescription before he can refill it.
“A simple procedure that takes five minutes can take 30 minutes because of a constant back and forth between doctors and insurance companies,” he said.
Joe Gould
I believe the term “high-life low-life” fits Joe Gould very well. He was definitely a “low-life” in that he was homeless, lived off of handouts and his diet consisted mainly of ketchup. Many people would probably look down at him as a vagrant at first glance. Despite this, Gould’s life was anything but low. Coming from a well-to-do family in the outskirts of Boston and being Harvard educated, Gould had intelligence and a unique few of the world. His eccentricities and aversion to money and physically possessions makes him more of a “high-life”. He sees the world in a different way than most would. Life for him was not about monetary values, but about experience.
Mitchell portrayed him in this “high-life low-life” way, showing us what Gould valued in his life other than money. Despite being homeless, Gould kept company with some of New York’s most successful and famous people, going to upscale parties quite frequently, adding to his “high-life” qualities. To those attending these parties and seeing him for the first time, he may seem a “low-life” when he begins reciting poems in “seagull” and flapping his arms about. Mitchell wrote that those at the party often came to enjoy Gould’s company by the end of the day. The story of Joe Gould shows us the value and life he had as a human being, not as a homeless man without a dime to his name.
Protected: profile draft
Joseph Mitchell
What do you think of New Yorker editor Harold Ross’s calling Joseph Mitchell’s profiles: “highlife-lowlife” pieces?
I think that this is an accurate way to describe Mitchell’s works. When profiling Joseph Gould he does mention that Gould studied at Harvard, but I feel like he sees him in a different class as his own. In Ross’s article about Mitchell, he questions the authenticity of his writing stating that “it’s clear Mitchell did make things up,” in some of his profiles. Although Mitchell comes from a higher class in society, he does take an interest in investigating those who pertain to a lower standard of living. This can be seen from the profile on Joe Gould. However, I found myself wondering if these events in Mitchell’s writing are true, because some of them seemed strange and extremely illogical. I questioned a lot of Gould’s project- the “oral history,” and upon realizing that Gould’s secret was that this was all indeed false, I realized that Mitchell and him both ended up fabricating events and situations in order to make their writing more interesting. It’s ironic to see that both Mitchell and Gould originate from a higher class life, yet Mitchell chooses to stay in it, and Gould does not. They were both similar in that they were only trying to write good works, but did not use true material to do so. Gould chooses to live a bohemian life, although he comes from a Harvard University education, but rejects that to live more freely. Mitchell stays in his educated, high class life, but along the way encounters Gould and sees an extreme form of exaggerating the reality in order to intrigue someone. With that being said, I definitely agree with Ross calling Mitchell’s profiles, “highlife-lowlife peices.”
Joe Gould’s Secret
What do you think of New Yorker editor Harold Ross’s calling Joseph Mitchell’s profiles: “highlife-lowlife” pieces?
I agree very much so with New York editor Harold Ross’s calling Joseph Mitchell’s profiles “highlife-lowlife” pieces. Joseph Mitchell would make his way around the city dapperly dressed in designer attire. He looked higher up in social class yet he never wanted to interview anyone that looked this way. Harold Ross writes, “The only people he didn’t care to listen to; were society woman, industrial leaders, distinguished authors, ministers, explorers, moving picture actors, and any actress under the age of thirty-five.” Mitchell was only interested in interviewing lower class, “low-life” types that had fascinating stories, whether he was elaborating them or not.
Joe Gould is a perfect example of a “low-life” profile done by a “high-life” Joseph Mitchell. Gould is an oddball and while seemingly he may seem to be of a higher stature it is merely a facade. Truly Joe Gould relied heavily on the support and charity of others. Possibly this is why he spent so long and filled over one hundred spiral notebooks with an “oral-history” and events in his life that were never even true. Gould having writers block was constantly writing and rewriting this. Mitchell spending much of his time writing about Gould was outraged when he found out that it was a lie and revealed Joe Gould’s “secret”, that this history was false. After writing this Mitchell had writers blocks and never really published anything for the rest of his life. The irony in this is that both Joe and Joe fabricated fascinating stories and could not collect their thoughts in their last pieces of work. Perhaps Mitchell’s reason for having writers block at the end of his life was because he was disturbed by how much of himself he saw in Gould.
Class Analysis: One Man’s Opus to New York’s Subway Art, Decades in the Making
We will dissect this feature story in class on Thursday, October 8th.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/08/nyregion/one-mans-opus-to-new-yorks-subway-art-decades-in-the-making.html?_r=0
Dasani Commentary and Critiques
I think It is ethical to leave out Dasani’s last name. Leaving her last name out just shows the delicacy Andre Elliot has for Dasani and her family. Yes, there is a good chance people can find out what her given name is, however I do think given her circumstances and given how graphic and personal this five part series is, excluding her last name is giving Dasani and her family the right to privacy in the only way possible. We already know about every other aspect of her life, so I don’t think a last name included in the story gives or takes away from the article.
The story to me is fine in length. In fact, I think Dasani’s story could be a great autobiography or nonfiction book. When reading this article, there is not one section or part of the article that is not engaging. Elliot adds so much description and detail that as a reader you can see what she is describing. Every aspect is covered, from Dasani’s living circumstance, her family, the projects she lives nearby, McKinney middle and high school, Dasani’s classmates and demographics. Elliot leaves no room for questioning. Everything is answered in details.
Policies and politics on homelessness is very relevant to the topic, however, this stories main focus in humanizing Dasani rather than categorizing her and shaping her into a girl that is a product of the problems faced by homelessness in NYC. The story is more focused on Dasani not being a product of her living circumstances. Dasani says it clearly.
“That’s not gonna be me,” she says. “Nuh-uh. Nope.”