Streetlevel: Knotting Slope Closes
After almost five years in their shop at 242 7th Avenue in Park Slope, the folks behind hand-made carpet specialty store Knotting Slope are calling it quits. According to OTBKB, they couldn’t afford the rent increase the owner wanted to charge. Their loss is your gain: there’s currently a big going-out-of-business sale underway. GMAP
After almost five years in their shop at 242 7th Avenue in Park Slope, the folks behind hand-made carpet specialty store Knotting Slope are calling it quits. According to OTBKB, they couldn’t afford the rent increase the owner wanted to charge. Their loss is your gain: there’s currently a big going-out-of-business sale underway. GMAP
What…you are entirely wrong about the length of Knotting Slope’s lease, and the extraordinary increase demanded by their landlord. Unlike the “old days,” very few landlords on 7th Ave. will rent anymore to start-up small businesses that are not connected to larger chains. When they do rent, they rent at a premium and only offer short leases. The owners of Knotting Slope are figuring out what to do once they close. Moving to Turkey is an option they’re considering, as a direct result of rent escalation, not the other way around. It’s bizarre to read some of the posts above asserting speculation as if it were truth. The same landlord, btw, owns the now shuttered premises of the relocated bagel store, and is seeking to lease all three storefronts to just one tenant.
Oh and Cafe Grumpy is opening on 7th also below 9th Street. Looking forward to that one.
Actually this is not in South Slope. It’s on 7th Avenue between 4th and 5th Streets. Have you been to Park Slope Bessie? ;))
DH – I couldn’t agree with you more. 7th Avenue rents are way higher than those on 5th though, which is why a few interesting things still manage to open up on 5th. There are some interesting things on 7th as well, but mainly below 9th Street…Beer Table comes to mind as an example.
I really wish these landlords would wake up and smell the coffee. The one good thing I will say about 7th as opposed to some of the other streets you’ve mentioned is that the spaces themselves are rather small and prevent too many chains from coming in…american apparel, a million starbucks, duane reades, cvs, etc.
I find Smith Street to be a drag these days…it’s getting to be mostly chains. 7th still somehow seems to hold up because the storefronts are so narrow.
Prices absolutely need to come down though. There is beginning to be a serious glut of open storefronts on 7th.
Oh, now I see. There’s another knitting shop right off 7th Ave. in Park Slop prime with a very similar facade. This is the one in the South Slope.
Don’t mean to be negative re: Park Slope – but commercial rents are WAY too high. I don’t understand why 5th Avenue commands such a premium over other main strips in other neighborhoods (Smith, Vanderbilt, Bedford)
This is why everything new and interesting in Brooklyn is opening in other neighborhoods. Landlords should really shape up, as empty storefronts don’t help anyone.
Bessie,
So 242 7th Avenue isn’t on 7th Avenue?
“The owner wanted to up the rent, but we can be 99% sure this place is going to now sit here vacant for months as the other storefronts (most owned by Berman Realty) have done all along 7th Avenue. ”
Sounds like the ‘Florent’ syndrome.
That store’s not on 7th Ave. And it’s not vacant yet. Based on location I’d guess it would rent for about $4K $4.5K/month, maybe less. RE tax could be as high as $13K/yr and insurance about $1,500. Add a mortgage for a property acquired in 2000-2006 and that could be another $36K a year or more. Add carrying costs for electrical and gas service when the space is untenanted, etc. Little if any spread….
holy cow