Friday, January 23, 2015

If You Can't Beat 'Em ...

Mission Cantina 485 West Street, South Amherst

One of the gripes you hear about food carts is that they have an "unfair" advantage over traditional bricks-and-mortar restaurants since they pretty much pay the town only a $100 annual fee to operate.

Restaurants of course either  pay a hefty downtown commercial rent to their landlord, or if they own the building, pay the whopping Amherst property tax that is twice that of neighboring Hadley.  And recently became even more oppressive with the doubling of the Community Preservation Act tax.

But because the lunch cart system, unlike liquor licenses, is not overly regulated it really is an equal opportunity, two-way street.

For instance, Mission Cantina, one of the more wildly successful restaurants located in the heart of South Amherst's microscopic business district will go before the venerable Amherst Select Board Monday night for a lunch cart license to bring their Mexican fare downtown this coming nice weather season.

Currently the town has two active lunch carts, Sun Kim Bop and New York Halal Food but this will be a first for an established restaurant entering the market.

Viva la competition!

Coming soon to a street near you

55 comments:

Anonymous said...

This a good thing? They take away much-need parking spaces.

Anonymous said...

Yes the town will crumble losing 3 parking spaces, NOT! I personally can't wait to grab a taco!

Anonymous said...

This is not a good thing. Take it to the Green River Festival, or some such thing, but to poach from the downtown restaurants that are struggling to pay rent, utilities, etc. is not laudable.

Anonymous said...

Gimmie a break. If Judies doesn't want to lose business, she should lower the prices! Why should WE have to subsidize their rents and expenses? Never seen so many business owners so afraid of competition.

At OUR expense!

Anonymous said...

Ha, you are right, Amherst restaurants hate competition which is funny because in the restaurant industry, good restaurants actually make your business better. Judie's is far from great food, but about the best "diner type" food around. Antonios is Ragu on cardboard. Pita Pockets is refreshingly wonderful. Bueno y Sano unique in their selection and taste, Amherst Chinese has gotten worse as years go on, Panda East passable and now better than its competitor. Pasta E Basta is laughable. Bertucci's - 'nough said. Glazed Donuts look amazing but are tasteless and the price surely is not reflective of the quality, either. And forget the management, rude. Amherst Brewing is frozen food in a lifeless atmosphere. White Hut has far too much to be desired. If it wasn't for Margaritas, Vera Cruz would be a tasteless a bore. Mission Cantina has the best atmosphere in Amherst, but menu is boring and so is the food, and it's run horribly, but not as bad as the new Mi Tierra which will make it another few months at the rate it's going. About the worst run place for 100 miles. Bottom line is most Amherst food sucks shit, so bring on some competition to weed out some of these shitty restaurants. Competition makes you better. Amherst hates competition so most Amherst food establishes suck. Of course there are some good ones I left off like the French place or El Comalito. Not every place in Amherst sucks, just seems like the ones that hate competition are the ones that can't pass a taste test compared to Chili's and Amherst has lots of those.

Anonymous said...

I think it's ridiculous to assume that a food truck will make a dent in a restaurant's business. Two entirely different customer bases. I'm pretty sure a significant number of people are not going to say let's go out to dinner or lunch, and then see a truck and change their plans. Doesn't even pass the common sense test. Richard Marsh

Anonymous said...

2:39 PM, thanks for the rundown reviews. I agree with them almost completely. You didn't mention some newbies, though. The new Thai place is pretty good. There's also an older Thai place near White Hut, right? I thought that one was 6/10. Massman curry. Yum!

Also, I will never, ever eat at Miss Saigon ever again. Two very bad experiences, will never return.

Anonymous said...

Talk to downtown restaurateurs and they will tell you they are still struggling to recover from the recession.

Anonymous said...

I have no problem with all the "Let the food trucks in!" people as long as you are consistent. Don't start crying for more firefighters, ambulances, police, teachers, or fire stations. Those come from the property tax paying businesses and the businesses that rent from them.

Larry Kelley said...

Yeah and Amherst has just under 10% commercial property tax base. Pathetic at best.

Let's get the tax-exempt institutes of higher education to pay their fair share.

Anonymous said...

Oriental Flavor is awesome. AWESOME!

Anonymous said...

The commercial base is way under appraised. How often do you see a commercial property selling for 3 to 4 times the appraised value. My house is appraised at 100% and maybe more if you look at the Zillow appraisal.

Anonymous said...

Them and everybody else . Boo-hoo. It's tough all over.

Anonymous said...

I now pay Amherst nearly double in property tax compared to what I paid on a $1.8M property in suburban Washington DC.

Still, I worry that I'm not paying my "fair share"....

Larry Kelley said...

Amherst is half owned by tax exempts.

Makes a BIG difference.

Anonymous said...

"Talk to downtown restaurateurs and they will tell you they are still struggling to recover from the recession."

_____________

That should say:

Talk to downtown restaurateurs and they will tell you they are still struggling to recover from having such inconsistent food and the loss of business as a result.

Yes, this country is in the dumps. People still do eat out though. Problem with Amherst is people now want to spend money where they get something for it. Many Amherst restaurants suck so people stopped going and spend money in better places.

Anonymous said...

Still, I worry that I'm not paying my "fair share"....

You mean your fare share. Everyone pays heavily to live in Amherst

Anonymous said...

Seems Paradise of India was left off the 'local' reviews. Pricey maybe, but beats any other Indian you can get this side of the Atlantic, unless you head into NYC.

Walter Graff said...

Hey, I know that truck. It's Montaco. I've seen it out on eastern Long Island.

Anonymous said...

Anon 2:39

Perhaps you haven't been to Amherst Chinese in the last week or two. I stopped going there a couple of years ago when it went way downhill, not to mention the terrible way they were treating their farm workers. We tried it again when we heard it had changed management and chef (but not owner). The food was excellent, but you have to like Sichuan style food as that's pretty much what they have changed to

Dr. Ed said...

Heaven forbid that anyone interfere with the captive market that is the UMass student body.

It isn't just the university that considers students to be an inexhaustible fungible resource...

Anonymous said...

"Paradise of India...beats any other Indian you can get this side of the Atlantic..."

Now I know this blog is one of the best showcases of local fiction.

Anonymous said...

"Paradise of India...beats any other Indian you can get this side of the Atlantic..."

Now I know this blog is one of the best showcases of local fiction.


____________


No, just the owner trying to get people to eat his bland food.

A poster on Yelp says it best:

"The food isn't horrible but I feel like I might be able to make slightly better Indian cuisine at home. For what they charge, the portions are insufficiently small."

Anonymous said...

Even in posts that have absolutely nothing to do with UMASS, Ed has to make it about UMASS. Wow Ed, you really need some help.

Anonymous said...

Even better, how about a guy form India who ate there:

Maybe living in India for 16 years really trains my taste buds to sense what good Indian food tastes like, but this is the absolute worst Indian food I have ever come across.

I ate here during my freshmen year and can still remember how horrible the food was. I remember ordering pakoras, chicken vindaloo and mango lassi. I must say that the pakoras were okay, the portion size could have been a little bigger but it tasted alright. Even a roadside vendor in the urban streets of Calcutta could have fared better. The chicken vindaloo certainly did not look like vindaloo and definitely did not taste like vindaloo. The dish was bland, the gravy too watery, and I could only taste the spicyness. It looked like they had run out of oil to cook with. The rice was good, but then how hard is it to cook rice? The mango lassi was the most edible. It did taste like mango lassi but it did lack the mouthfeel of real mangoes.

The ambiance suggested that it was there to milk foreigner's money who thought they were being served Indian food. They look like they arent going to change with their extremely high prices for the low quality food they serve.

You really want a good Indian place, try India House @ Northhampton. Trust me, you wont be disappointed with the commute and their prices are fairly close.

Anonymous said...

Funny that a restaurant would want to join that cavalcade of bad reviews. Like the old Woody Allen bit about the two folks dining and one says to the other "the food here is terrible." To which the other replied "yes, and such small portions."

Anonymous said...

This bit about the food truck has turned into what could become a never ending source of restaurant reviews. Regarding Mi Tiera, my husband and I had a great meal there one afteroon. The restaurant was hosting some kind of function at the time and the place was packed. The only negative thing I could see was that the drinks were a little slow in coming. But that's about it server we had was great.

Anonymous said...

Skip the new Mi Tiera. Heartwarming comeback, but heartburn inducing food.

Prof RM said...

Equal punishment is not the kind of equality we are shooting for. Perhaps the problem here is that the town is involved in any way, when they have no expertise or any thing to offer in any way. This is kind of like one town business complaining that the mob in a town is charging more for "protection" vs. what their neighbor is shaken down...I mean charged for....wait this is not a lot like that, it is exactly like that. It is the exact same system - pay us or we will harass you out of business. The restaurants and food carts can run themselves without the town slowing them down or extracting money - in fact they will run better. If the town steps back and charges both of them nothing and has no involvement, now that's equality. The town does not need to get involved in competition, something it knows nothing about. If a food cart puts restaurants in town out of business, that is what was supposed to happen. If Judy's is worried about a food cart, that gives me the impression they are not confident in their food or business practices. This is pretty simple.

But if you disagree and like navigating layers of govt so you can do basic things like run a small business, why not add 6 more layers, why not 10 or 30. This is why wages for low income workers have been flat for 20 years, their raises (and chances of being employed) go to regulators that produce nothing except hurdles (the #1 product now made in the USA, all by govt workers).

Anonymous said...

Mi Tierra has tried hard to relive the experience but it seems they are too big for themselves. They even begged people to comeback after a few opening weeks of utter disaster on their FB page apologizing for not having it together. Namely no one gets the food they ordered and the unprofessional staff is at best, scattered, and completely overwhelmed. Look at the Yelp reviews and you will see that moving a restaurant into a larger location with new, completely untrained staff and no money, is difficult at best. With little capital, it's been a really struggle for the owners. Let's hope they can survive as they are losing customer loyalty fast.

Anonymous said...

Let's hope many Amherst restaurant owners read this post and work a bit harder to make the experience better as it is clearly lacking in many establishments.

Larry Kelley said...

Oh, they read me alright. (But probably will never advertise here.)

Anonymous said...

Encouraging food trucks is like allowing someone to live in a tent on your front lawn while you pay the property taxes.

Larry Kelley said...

Except in this particular case the food truck will be owned by an existing restaurant establishment who covers town taxes via their rent.

Anonymous said...

It would be nice if they register the truck in MA. It's been sitting there with the out of state plates for months.

Anonymous said...

It's the American dream. But you can you never packed, and a food truck on every corner.

Anonymous said...

Ugh. That was supposed to read "a chicken in every pot and a food truck on every corner." Joke over.

Anonymous said...

If they want to serve food downtown, they should rent space there like everyone else. What's next, a guy with a pliers offering car repairs working out of the parking lot?

Anonymous said...

Amherst is not alone. In hundreds of cities across the country, the food truck industry is growing and causing debate. Some cities are mulling the possibly of more taxes from trucks, others are feeling pressure from local restaurants. More business means more competition and that is not always bad.

Anonymous said...

When IS competition bad? Oh! I forgot. It can lead to (sniff) hurt feelings.

Anonymous said...

Hey, there is no such thing as losing. Everyone gets a trophy. It doesn't matter if you win or lose and all the other bullshit they teach the poor kids in this town. Wait till they get squashed like bugs in the real world.

Anonymous said...

I'm still trying to understand what UMass has to do with any of this, as suggested at 7:29 AM.

Dr. Ed said...

"If they want to serve food downtown, they should rent space there like everyone else."

As I understand it, these are considered "mobile food carts" which are required to operate out of a fixed address where the food is is stored and prepared -- and where the cart (truck) is cleaned & sanitized on a daily basis.

It can be a restaurant, which makes the inspector's job easier, but the base has to meet all the food code requirements of a restaurant.

They are paying property taxes (or rent which includes property taxes) on this base location. And if this location isn't in Amherst, then perhaps Amherst ought not have taxes twice as high as neighboring communities.

Dr. Ed said...

"What's next, a guy with a pliers offering car repairs working out of the parking lot?"

What do you call the guy who comes to fix your furnace? The company I'm thinking of is in Sunderland -- and pays taxes to the Town of Sunderland -- but does a *lot* of HVAC work in Amherst.

On a mores serious note, what is the difference between a food truck and food delivered to your residence? In both cases, food is prepared somewhere else and then brought to and sold at a location more convenient to the customer.

In both cases the customer is able to avoid patronizing a local sit-down restaurant -- but the customer wasn't going to do that anyway.......

Dr. Ed said...

"I'm still trying to understand what UMass has to do with any of this."

There are lots of UM students spending money locally and there are two ways in which one can be the person receiving their money.

One is to provide a higher value at a lower price, it's called "competition."

The other is to prevent competition so that they have no choice but to purchase your overpriced and/or inferior product. That's known as "restraint of trade", establishing a "monopoly" and the grounds for anti-trust actions.

Remember how high long-distance telephone rates were back when AT&T had a monopoly?

Anonymous said...

What do you call a guy that is obsessed with a town he doesn't live in

Answer: Ed.

Anonymous said...

Forget that. Hersheys had enough pull to stop the import of Cadbury. Seems like Amherst businesses, shitty chocolate is afraid of competition so you can no longer buy English made chocolate here. Say goodbye to Cadbury eggs.

Anonymous said...

Free country. Ed can be obsessed with anything he likes! lol. Just not my daughter.

Anonymous said...

Easter won't be the same.

Anonymous said...

That info's all wrong. There's still Cadbury Eggs. It's just that Hershey paid for the license to manufacture them in the U.S. so they can't be imported.

Anonymous said...

They are not real Cadbury eggs. Hershey uses substitutes for some of the best ingredients for chocolate which is why Hersey chocolate sucks.
We lose the import of real Cadbury products.

Hershey won a lawsuit claiming that Cadbury labeling looked too much like Hershey which is fucking ridiculous because they look NOTHING alike but clearly a court got paid the right amount of chocolate to agree.

The only Cadbury eggs you can buy are made by Hershey and they are not made with the same ingredients and taste inferior to the real thing if you've ever done a side-by-side.

http://www.upi.com/Business_News/2015/01/26/Hershey-sues-to-stop-British-chocolate-imports-angering-Cadbury-fans/3361422284209/

Anonymous said...

Blame Cadbury for licensing the rights to make it to Hershey. They wanted the money more than keeping the product quality the same.

Anonymous said...

It has NOTHING to do with Cadbury, rather the court case was with the American distributor who Hershey claimed was illegally importing Cadbury candy that looked like Hershey packaging. Cadbury made a deal with Hershey to manufacture as a result and Hershey promises it will be the same. Doubt it.

Anonymous said...

English made taste better!

Anonymous said...

Who gives a flyin' bleep about Cadbury eggs. Like the 5 year olds who eat them notice a difference?