Small on purpose

the joys of small town mafias

Today is the anniversary of the Killdozer event that happened back in 2004, when Marvin Heemeyer rolled over the town of Granby, CO with his custom made Bulldozer. Tired of their small town constrictive politics, stealing, code “enforcement” and just the general squeeze they put on him and his small mechanics shop (because they wanted his property and he was an outsider), he rolled over all of the buildings in the town and then blew his own head off inside the contraption. He didn’t hurt any people, just collapsed their stupid town hall and their stupid shops…he was obsessed with fighting for his rights and they drove him to the brink. “I have become unreasonable…” he said, in his manifesto. That was the hill he’d die on. Literally.

My oldest brother would have done something like that. I remember when I was too young to know the gut punch of someone stealing your business after a down payment and then running off with equipment, he was scammed…and I knew it was the end for him. He would have done a Heemeyer but instead kept it inside and died of a brain tumor. Same year actually. 2004. He was the age I am now.

I too have been shut out from small town goons a time or two. After I sold my two small restaurants outside of Atlanta, I went to a rural mountain town. The pilot light of restaurants is always on in your lizard brain after you’ve been in the business for a while. I imagine it’s how couples who should get a divorce decide to have another kid. Why not? How hard can it be?

I had a couple of Sunnybrook Farm delusional plans for an old country store and another for a vacant cafe in a “charming village” in Northeast Georgia. The latter fell apart when the old woman who owned it whispered too loudly to her sycophant sons, “I don’t like her, she asks too many questions…” and for good reason. I was a relatively seasoned restaurateur who had learned what an idiot I was on a couple of commercial leases in the past. I knew what to ask for and my inquiry as to why Georgia Power said that all of the units in the building got billed to the cafe’s account… I was dismissed.

How many middle aged ladies had tried that business with a nice banana bread and chicken salad on marble rye had gone asunder with a crippling electric bill they couldn’t afford. The chandelier store below the cafe had all the lights on even on a holiday weekend when everything was shuttered. That belonged to the son. It all made sense in 8 minutes of a walk through. Also, I imagined, a fire hazard. (Fun fact: someone else rented the place and in a couple years it did in fact burn to the ground taking nearly the entire block with it. Faulty wiring, not considered arson, case closed. )

The hubris of young success had me high on ideas for a general store on a busy shady highway on the way to a lake where rich hillbillies, country singers and frat boys went water skiing in summer. A no brainer! I can’t believe there isn’t a Peggy’s General Store here right now with gas, propane, wine and amazing panini sandwiches! I’ll do it! I imagined the parades they’d have in my honor for saving their town and making their lives better. The tax revenue I’d raise alone for the town would get me a bench in the town square. I’d try to remain humble.

Not available, can’t find the records, been closed for a decades, tied up in probate, the Riselle family owns it and they don’t want a general store there, termites, ghosts, you name it. NOT AVAILABLE (*to you)

More recently, I’ve just gotten the $9000 rent with a triple net lease quote, which is another type of mafia. I call it the Starbuckian Cartel. When the developer of a new building overvalues it so they can get a Dunkin’ or a MedSpa in there but instead it sits vacant for a decade and they get a tax write off. (I see you Tulsa) Gone are the days where an indie gal and her candle idea can get a tiny store front for $950 a month and sell flowers on the sidewalk. Anywhere that would be affordable is in a place where people don’t have money for candles. Like here!

But I would never open my sweet retirement flower shop in this town. I can smell the Small and Shitty on Purpose vibes. Where in 2023 can you find some waterfront property with good weather where there are dozens of vacant houses, no services, no address for delivery even. Miles of open coastline and you have to drive 3 hours to the next town to buy sneakers. Or pizza. it’s like this because the boa constrictor families want it this way. You have to shop at their crappy hardware store, stay in their overpriced hotel with lousy service and pay what you pay at the tienda and pharmacy.

The corner store guy has been here 40 years and he knows they are squeezing him out for his location. There’s a big beer store in the middle of his corner holdings and he said today…I’m selling all of this before the mob boss on the corner stubs me out. I want him to win. I want him to sell it to a Chinese Lithium billionaire to put a Walmart in. But it will likely just be a bigger beer store, owned by Anheuser Busch which is Belgian owned now. And a place to launder Euros. Not Mexican, not American. But like everything else, we’ll find that Modelo is actually owned by Blackrock. But the Chinese quietly quietly build their new docking station for the natural gas pipeline. Still can’t buy a cup of coffee here but they’re extracting gas from the area and shipping it to Asia. Toodles!

So people survive on secret market reselling from home. Tacos, cakes, stuff they get from Costco and markup. Tons of eyelash and brow threading and dye. Fingernails of course. I guess that’s the black market? Just knock off Nikes and Bad Bunny tshirts from a concert you didn’t attend. We have Big Lots and TJMaxx in the States, they have Stuff I Grabbed from a Container that Flipped Over from the place my cousin works. And good for them.

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