This blog might be for like 1,000 people, but word of mouth might help me achieve the goal. Surely there has to be one prominent real estate developer who reads this site and can get shit done in Fishtown. Because if you live in here, NoLibs, Olde or New Kensington, you know one thing that isn’t a problem and that’s the lack of coffee shops. There is a coffee shop on every corner. I do a quick search on Google Maps and I feel the walls closing in:

This neighborhood is too beaned up and I refuse to believe every single one of these places is making enough money to stay open. There’s a new one every week! We don’t need any more coffee shops. What we do need in this great neighborhood is a sports bar.

I’ve been ringing the bell for a sports bar since I moved in two years ago. Since then. Nada. Nothing. Zilch. In that time there have been 20 coffee shops that have sprouted up all in a mile radius. My tipping point was Monday, when I heard Starbucks is coming in a block from the La Colombe:

ONE BLOCK! From the largest coffee shop in the neighborhood. A block away from a bagel place that sells coffee that is a block away from another coffee spot and another and another. This is simple supply & demand. The worst one is down at Frankford & York at the roundabout. There are two coffee shops on each end staring at each other. They have to be fucking with me at this point:

How can the neighborhood design and permit a million coffee shops, but we can’t do one sports bar? Garage, Fishtown Tavern, Frankford Hall, Bottle Bar, Kosta’s, Nut Hut etc. don’t count. All great bars in their own right, but if you think of them and your first thought isn’t “sports” then it’s not a sports bar. I’m talking ones like Founding Fathers, Urban Saloon, or Cav’s. Somewhere I know I’m going to walk in and there will be sports on every single TV. No matter where I stand in the place I can see a TV. Yesterday I locked myself out of the house so I walked over to a bar while waiting for a locksmith. There were two TVs in this place. I had to wait for the Phils game to end to watch the Knicks get bludgeoned because the bar only had two TVs and the capacity for one sport. This is what we call an investment opportunity people!


Look I’ve probably only got 18-24 months left in this city. This isn’t even a plea for me. It’s a plea for the youth. The future of this country. If you’re a developer in this city don’t do it for me. Do it for them. I’ll help you even market the thing. I’ll cut the red ribbon with the giant scissors.

Kinkead: I’m going to go ahead and add that the small neighborhood bars on the eastern side of Fishtown also don’t count. Les and Doreen’s is a good example. They’ll show the Phils and Eagles games, but it’s a corner bar. There’s nowhere in this area that has a bunch of TVs where people gather specifically to watch sports. What’s particularly sad is that we used to get in the car and drive to Miller’s Ale House (a chain) next to IKEA to watch the UFC pay per views. It was pathetic. And don’t assume that everyone who lives in the area is a hipster. There are hipster pockets up and down Frankford, yes, but as you go east across Susquehanna and Norris we’re talking old school, multi-generational families and Philly sports diehards. Blue collar types.