Let’s take a break from condos this week! Not necessarily in the moratorium sense – I mean, let’s talk for a change about three local businesses expanding elsewhere in the city.
First, congratulations to 826 Valencia, a.k.a. the Pirate Supply Store. The nonprofit, founded by writer Dave Eggers and educator Nínive Calegari, helps under-resourced children improve their writing skills with free writing labs and workshops. The pirate supply store, offering mundane items reimagined into whimsical pirate needs like plumes, potions, and talismans, helps support the tutoring center in the back.
It’s by no means 826’s first expansion. The nonprofit has grown into a national organization, which started writing centers across the nation with storefronts including the Superhero Supply Store in Brooklyn, the Time Travel Mart in Los Angeles, and the Secret Agent Supply Store in Chicago. But back to the local – 826 is one of top 10 winners of Google’s Bay Area Impact Challenge Grant. Their newfound $500,000 will help them open a writing center in the Tenderloin to reach local kids there.
Wise Sons Jewish Deli, with its primary location on 24th Street, is also expanding, Eater reports. Their move takes them to Fillmore and Geary, where they will replace the commissary kitchen they used to have in the Mission and 22nd street building that burned down in January. They’ll also be adding a production bakery and a bagel shop, though these are slated to open in December.
Meanwhile, grocery Duc Loi will open a branch in the Bayview. The market, currently on Mission and 18th streets, is known for its cheap but delicious banh mi sandwiches as well as its massive Thanksgiving feasts that the owners give away for free to whoever shows up every year. Duc Loi stepped up to fill the spot on Third Street after a concerted effort by city staff to make sure that the former Fresh & Easy location would still be supplying healthy produce to Bayview residents. Fresh & Easy was the Bayview’s only full-service grocery, a role that Duc Loi will now take over. Read more about that at SFGate.
But of course, it’s not just expansion outward. Everyone still wants to come here, that hasn’t changed.
One newcomer to the neighborhood is making waves before having even arrived. You probably already know I’m talking about the Alamo Drafthouse, which, in case you missed it, is a movie theater opening on in the former New Mission Theater building on Dec. 17 with Star Wars: Episode VII: The Force Awakens. The Austin-based Drafthouse, as you might guess from the name, is about more than just films, serving beer and food in its theaters during films – though they’re also dead serious about silence during the movie. Read more about the opening at Eater, or see what founder Tim League had to say about coming to the Mission, preserving historic buildings, and the local scene back in July of last year.
Even medical big shots want a piece of the neighborhood. One Medical Group plans to open a primary care clinic on Valencia Street between 16th and 17th streets. They’ll be the second medical services newcomer, joining Sutter Health, who is moving into the ground floor of the V20 building on Valencia and 20th streets. That opening is tentatively planned for December.