Tag Archives: retail

‘A little bit of everything’ — How Standard Goods grew from 10 years of retail on Capitol Hill

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Reaching a ten-year anniversary is a quiet victory for any small shop. It is a milestone that feels especially significant on the ever-changing streets of Capitol Hill. For Standard Goods, what started as a storefront next to the HoneyHole back in 2015 has grown into a local fixture with a few locations. But if you ask owner Jeff Gardner, the journey was anything but a straight line.

“I screwed that up so bad,” Gardner says with a laugh, looking back on opening day. “It was terrible. It was so bad.”

Coming from a life in wholesale that had him living out of a suitcase 30 weeks a year, Gardner launched Standard Goods in December 2015 at the location that previously housed occult bookstore Edge of the Circle with big ideas and what he thought was a handle on the neighborhood vibe. He missed the mark, badly, on one key thing: the prices. His initial focus was on premium, American-made goods, with shirts running around $120, a number that immediately felt out of step with the pocketbooks of most Capitol Hill locals.

“I had never lived in Capitol Hill, and I didn’t understand the clientele,” he admits. “My goal was always to cater to the people that lived and worked here, and we were pricing a lot of people out. So we had to pivot.” Continue reading →

‘Hey, what should go in this space?’ — Calls from neighborhood to fill empty Kaiser Permanente Capitol Hill campus spaces being answered along 15th Ave

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Thanks to a CHS reader for the picture

Kaiser Permanente has responded to calls from the neighborhood to do more to fill the empty retail spaces of its Capitol Hill campus along 15th Ave. There is a new property management effort in place, a new coffee shop lined up to join the campus, and a survey process underway to shape what kind of businesses are courted to help fill in other spaces along this stretch of Capitol Hill.

CHS reported earlier this year on calls for Kaiser to do meet its requirements for activating its streetfront spaces from the citizen Implementation Advisory Committee that oversees the city’s Major Institution Master Plan put in place in 2018 after the health care provider’s takeover of Group Health.

The retail spaces lost tenants coming out of the pandemic and have remained empty for years.

A Kaiser Permanente spokesperson says it has now finalized an agreement with a firm to manage its “available retail locations,” saying Health Hospitality Partners is a healthcare amenities company “that works exclusively with hospitals and health systems to bring modern retail onsite.” Continue reading →

A visit to Haunted Burrow Books, Capitol Hill’s horror and dark fantasy book shop

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This literary spirit is pretty fun in corporeal form. Haunted Burrow Books has made a spooky story-filled home on 15th Ave E.

A recent power outage helped set the appropriate mood in the bustling commercial district on the top of Capitol Hill. Inside Haunted Burrow, a reading group gathered, divining with tarot cards “in the back of the store by electronic candlelight.” Continue reading →

You’re right, the menswear guy — Capitol Hill’s Twice Sold Tales is pretty great

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CHS has been giving love to Capitol Hill’s Twice Sold Tales for years. We celebrated its 35th year of serving Capitol Hill book lovers here a few years back.

Owner Jamie Lutton and her Harvard Ave shop got some more love earlier this month with some attention from a social media tastemaker. Derek Guy — the @dieworkwear fella who has gained a wide following puncturing the tasteless shells of some of the worst people on the planet by sartorial examination — called out Lutton and Twice Sold in a recent post. Continue reading →

LOVECITYLOVE — ShopRite edition — joins effort to keep 15th Ave E active in long wait for redevelopment

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(Image: Love City Love)

(Image: Love City Love)

A Capitol Hill street living in limbo awaiting a wave of redevelopment.

An arts venue that has made its way through the liminal spaces created by the neighborhood’s relentless change.

It’s the perfect match.

You can add the everything you need and more spirit of dearly departed neighborhood convenience store ShopRite to the mix.

LOVECITYLOVE has landed on 15th Ave E.

The nomadic arts venture that has made its home in a variety of soon-to-be-demolished, destined-for-redeveloped storefronts across Capitol Hill and Seattle is now resident at 15th and Republican in the emptied out cornershop where ShopRite served the neighborhood for 30 years.

It is beginning its days on this new corner of the Hill with a schedule of open mics, sewing classes, and cafe hours. Continue reading →

City-run grocery stores in New York? Seattle Councilmember ‘not looking to legislate anything’ after Broadway Whole Foods shutdown

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Zohran Mamdani’s political surge in New York City, of course, has a grocery store element.

Soaring prices, faded services, and eroded humanity are an industry-wide trend that is hitting hardest in America’s largest, busiest, most expensive cities.

With this month’s nearly overnight closure of the Broadway Whole Foods only the latest major grocery corporation cutback in the city, don’t look to Seattle leadership to champion city-run grocery stores — yet.

“I’m not looking to legislate anything,” District 3 representative Joy Hollingsworth told CHS about her comments following the rapid shutdown of the Broadway at Madison Whole Foods two weeks ago. Continue reading →

Three years after Starbucks boarded the place up and left, All the Best ready to serve Capitol Hill pets on E Olive Way

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(Image: All the Best)

A new era for an E Olive Way commercial building begins Friday as All the Best debuts its new Capitol Hill store:

After sitting vacant, boarded up, and behind fencing since 2022, this historic space has been transformed into a bright, welcoming destination for Capitol Hill’s pet lovers. Local illustrator Sarah Robbins helped bring the space to life with a joyful mural that reflects the energy of the neighborhood—and the pets we serve.

Starting on the 13th, All the Best says it is welcoming dogs (“and brave cats”) with “tasty treats, and offering personalized recommendations on the best food, treats, and gear to help them thrive.” Continue reading →

Cyberattack at massive grocery distributor hitting Capitol Hill-area stores large and small

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(Image: Amazon Fresh)

Shopping in Capitol Hill-area grocery stores has become wacky enough that shoppers may not have noticed that a cyberattack targeting massive distributor United Natural Foods is causing bare spots on shelves and inventory problems at local stores. Continue reading →

Haunted Burrow Books will make temporary home on Capitol Hill block destined for demolition and development

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(Image: Haunted Burrow Books)

(Image: Haunted Burrow Books)

The shapeshifting mix of short-term pop-ups, flea markets, and retail experiments that are keeping the old QFC block of 15th Ave E active in anticipation of coming mixed-use redevelopment will include a spooky temporary guest.

Haunted Burrow Books and its offerings of “horror, dark fantasy, sci-fi, and other moody genres” is getting ready to haunt the street for an ephemeral stay in the mix.

Owner and editor Roxanne Guiney has announced a June 20th grand opening for the temporary Capitol Hill horror and dark fantasy book shop: Continue reading →

Capitol Hill is dead — The Rhino Room is selling couches

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(Image: CHS)

Six months after going dark and quietly ending its 11-year run of Capitol Hill nightlife, the former Rhino Room space at 11th and Pine is suddenly filled with furniture as custom retailer Couch has moved to Capitol Hill from Ballard.

“Pick one of our thoughtfully designed styles or work with us to come up with a new variation. We are custom builders in the truest sense of the word,” the store’s pitch goes. “Custom elsewhere can mean you get to choose blue instead of gray. At Couch it means you design a sofa in your exact size, style and comfort specifications.” Continue reading →