Bagelsaurus acquires Cambridge Clogs storefront for May expansion – and that means more bagels
A customer gets one of the last available bagels on Friday at Bagelsaurus near Cambridge’s Porter Square. (Photo: Marc Levy)
Bagelsaurus, the Porter Square favorite for bagels, has acquired the storefront next door, formerly Cambridge Clogs, and says it will expand its store in May.
“Cambridge Clogs took the opportunity to move into a larger space down the street, so with that empty space we have the opportunity to increase production, which is really exciting,” Bagelsaurus owner Mary Ting Hyatt said.
Bagelsaurus started in 2013 as a weekly pop-up at Cutty’s, a sandwich shop in Brookline. It opened nearly 10 years ago in a Cambridge storefront at 1796 Massachusetts Ave., that – at only about 1,000 square feet – limits the amount of bagels workers can produce. The eatery has become known for its busy interior and lines snaking down the street, especially on weekends; but many people queuing up, or stopping in optimistically as early as lunchtime when lines have died down, will be confronted by an all-too familiar sign on the door announcing the shop is sold out. (We recently tried and loved a Bagelsaurus sandwich.)
“Some might say selling out of bagels is part of our charm, but I think it’s gotten old for a lot of people,” Hyatt said. “I think people would really love to see us staying open closer to the hours that we advertise.”
The Upper Crust pizzeria and Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers closed their neighboring storefronts in Neighborhood 9 near Porter Square on Dec. 18, with Upper Crust’s owner citing rent increases. The Violette bakery relocated from its nearby space in the same strip of stores to take over the bigger Upper Crust space, which allowed it to add seating. Cambridge Clogs, which sells shoes and socks, moved from one end of the strip to another.
Adding the empty Cambridge Clogs space will give Hyatt and the Bagelsaurus team almost 500 more square feet to work with.
The number of bagels the store can produce is limited by the amount of refrigerators it can fit in its kitchen, because all the bagels go into refrigerators overnight. “The new space will enable us to fit some extra refrigeration, make more bagels, store more bagels and hopefully make the space a little more comfortable for customers as well,” Hyatt said. There may not be more seating, but she’s hoping to make the customer experience “less chaotic, with a better flow.”
The renovation will include work on the flooring and walls, plus getting the new equipment in. She hopes to open sometime in May.
One thing that won’t change with the expansion: There’s no parking in the rear lot. Bagelsaurus’ tightly packed Massachusetts Avenue neighbors have been “very patient with our crowd,” Hyatt said.
It’s exciting to hear that Bagelsaurus and Cambridge Clogs are both expanding. This comes on the heels of Christopher’s and Toad being acquired by the owners of the Burren, and Violette Bakery’s expansion.
It’s great to see that these experienced business owners are confident in expanding their businesses in Porter Sq! Given the concerns raised surrounding the installation of bike lanes in the area, I hope we can all agree that this is a truly reassuring sign, hopefully of a future ahead with less division about these valuable projects.
Chris, the article neglected to mention that I closed my store because of the bike lanes. The net result is a loss of retail stores not a gain.
Daniel, I think it is important to note that you announced that you were closing your store before any bike lanes were installed. The lawsuit in which you were a plaintiff had an injunction to stop and remove the bike lanes, on the basis that the businesses would be irreparably harmed if the lanes were installed. That assertion is inconsistent with the present business climate.
It is time that we asking _whether_ to do these projects, and start looking at how to best execute them.
As a businessman, someone who understands how small businesses operate and run, I didn’t need to wait for the bike lanes to actually reach my storefront. The bike lanes nearby were already impacting my business on a daily basis. My business was irreparably harmed because I had to close a store I ran for 40 years because the plans were to remove the parking where I was too. I wasn’t going to struggle to maintain the level of income I needed to survive and die a slow death there. Again, the only NEW business on the block is the new bakery which basically replaced a pizza parlor that couldn’t support itself there already. You can think what you want but the only businesses truly surviving there are food businesses and things like salons. If that’s your idea of a robust business environment than perhaps you should go back to school.
The plan is not to remove all the parking, and there’s actually a decent chance there will still be parking in front of this stretch of businesses.
The configuration for the stretch where Bagelsaurus is hasn’t been published yet, of course, so we don’t know for sure whether it’ll be parking only on one side, or both. However, if you look at https://www.cambridgema.gov/-/media/Files/publicworksdepartment/Administration/communityrelationspdfsandfiles/massavepcopenhouseboardscombined12052023.pdf, it has a “typical cross section” with a bus lane on the northbound side and parking on the southbound side (slide 5). The motivation is that the bus going north at rush hour gets stuck in traffic.
In other words, there’s a very good chance Bagelsaurus etc will continue to have street parking when the designs for this stretch come out.
Much of the stretch leading from the Cambridge Common to Linnaean will keep almost all the parking on both sides, per City plans. https://www.cambridgema.gov/-/media/Files/publicworksdepartment/Administration/communityrelationspdfsandfiles/massavepcopenhouseboarddraftcurbuse.pdf explains that “curbside activity can be maintained on both sides” although “Some on-street metered parking will be converted to space for new crosswalks, turn lanes, loading and accessible parking.”
“The bike lanes nearby were already impacting my business on a daily basis. My business was irreparably harmed because I had to close a store I ran for 40 years because the plans were to remove the parking where I was too”
How is something irreparably harmed by plans for something to happen exactly? How is your business impacted on a daily basis by something that doesn’t even exist yet?
“You can think what you want but the only businesses truly surviving there are food businesses and things like salons”
This dynamic is mirrored in retail areas around the country. It has nothing to do with bike lanes and everything to do with Amazon and online retail in general.
Have you ever considered that maybe making yourself an enemy of your neighbors’/customers’ safety isn’t good for business?
Spirer is a clown and terrible business man who has no one to blame but himself.
We called about a ring and without meeting or asking a single question started implying that we couldn’t afford his jewelry.
We took our business to another jeweler (with zero parking) and had the best experience.
Your store being gone couldn’t be farther from a loss for Cambridge.
Daniel, my wife and I have been customers of your store for many years, as have many others I know who appreciate your craftsmanship. Having a unique product is what makes people shop at your store and others, such as Bagelsaurus, not having a parking spot right in front. Most times I arrived at your store by bike. You appear to have made your decision based on unfounded fear. There are numerous studies showing installation of bike lanes is either neutral or good for business. Many people want to safely shop without using a car. If they can do so, the few people who need to use a car will find it easier to do so.
Again, you all need to think about this the way someone who actually has run a business does. I may not have lost the parking in front of my store but Cambridge had already begun a massive disruption to the parking and driving throughout the city. So I, because I actually run a business, started doing two things. I began asking all of my customers about the issue and I researched where my business was actually coming from. 90% of my customers and 95% of my gross income, came from outside of Cambridge. Additionally most of my customers were over the age of 55. Most of them hated driving in to Cambridge because of all the changes made all over the city, not just what was happening right in front of my store. So if most of my customers don’t want to drive into Cambridge to begin with and most of my customers come from outside of Cambridge, and they were going to remove even some of my parking then I was pretty much screwed long term. Randy, I appreciate your support over the years but I couldn’t survive on a half dozen or so locals who biked into my shop. I really don’t think many people who haven’t run a small business understand the costs involved of running one.
If 90% of your customers are actually from outside the city and drive to your business (and it is very likely you are significantly over estima to by that: https://phys.org/news/2021-07-shoppers-mobility-habits-retailers-overestimate.html ) why pay premium rents to locate in Cambridge in a walkable area and near the T?
This is also ignoring that the lack of local business for you could be partly because you have publicly made yourself an enemy of your neighbors safety.
1)I track my customers closely and I know exactly who was spending what and where they are from. I wasn’t a big business. I personally dealt with all of them so my estimations were based on fact.
2) when I opened my store (possibly before you were even born) there wasn’t an issue with parking like there is now. And at the time more of my customers were located in Cambridge but that changed over time.
3) if I decided to relocate 5 or 6 years ago because of the demographic changes and the parking issue it would have cost me $2-300,000 to open a new store. It takes decades to pay off an investment like that.
4) I gave more to Cambridge over the 40 years I was in business there than you will ever give. If I am a public enemy then your priorities have truly gotten completely screwed up.
5) for more than 20 years I roller skated all over the streets of Cambridge (Somerville and Boston too) and I never once had a problem. But that was probably because I actually paid attention to what I was doing when I was on the streets. The only time I ever had an accident was on a bike path when another skater clipped me.
1) says you. I have no reason to believe you without evidence considering there are multiple studies showing business owners consistently over estimate the number of people driving to their store.
2) Again you seem to lack any reflection on the fact that opposing the safety of your neighbors might contribute to that change. Also it is good that parking is harder now. Free and easy parking is a bad thing and it actually costs the public a lot of money.
https://youtu.be/Akm7ik-H_7U?si=0mWPZliH2ndS93wn
3) anything to discount that you know you benefit from being in a walkable urban community huh?
4) You have decided to publicly oppose street safety improvements in the community you have located your business in. It is your priorities that are screwed up. You genuinely might want to reflect on why people might not appreciate business owners prioritizing their (misguided ideas about) their profits over their lives.
5) of course you throw in some victim blaming for good measure. Your anecdote is nice but the facts about how many people are hit by cars really speak for themselves.
1) my entire business is based on trust. I am in a business where people give me pieces worth tens of thousands of dollars and trust that I will handle it properly which I have always done. Understand that I am a one person business (my wife helps out). I know where every single customer lives and comes from. I can assure you that over the period of 2020 until I closed my store that my estimates are not actually estimates. They are facts down to the dollar.
2) the changes in Cambridge roadways began before I was publicly speaking out about it. It was already apparent. Additionally for my entire time in business the biggest complaint all of my customers had was parking. The changes only made it worse.
3) when almost all of your customers come from out of town and skew older then no I see nor saw any benefit from it being walkable.
4) if you ACTUALLY look at the figures available from the Cambridge police department and you have the capacity to do a realanalysis on them you will see that accidents went up in areas bike lanes were added.
5) one person died in Porter Square on a bicycle in the 40 years I was there and he was not in the bike lane where he belonged. Based on this fact I would say that the odds of someone being killed on a bike, in Porter Square, riding where they belong in a bike lane are far lower than being hit by lightning. I wasn’t putting profit over lives. I was just trying to make a living for my family from a true small business. What do you do for work?
https://www.yahoo.com/news/san-francisco-restaurant-owner-goes-021845085.html
1) I’m not one of your customers I have no reason to trust you. And you being trust worthy with Jewelry does not mean you are trust worthy or competent in traffic studies.
2)That people who drive are more likely to complain about parking than those who take the T, bike, or walk are to announce that to you is one reason why your perspective on this isn’t objective.
3) why should Cambridge orient its infrastructure decisions not around its own residents but around your customers who come from out of town and by your own words hate it? You dodged that question. Why is it the city’s problem that despite being located in a walkable area you have not earned the trust of your neighbors and instead rely on outsiders? The elderly also walk btw, AARP is a big supporter of bike lanes and street improvements for pedestrians (which you actively oppose).
4)this isn’t true. From everything I’ve seen the total crashes is going down. Even if it were true, and again it isn’t, that is how you lie with statistics because considerably more people are biking. It is possible for the total number of crashes to go up while the individual risk per rider drops significantly, but again that isn’t even happening here. There have been total reductions in crashes on streets with protected bike lanes in Cambridge. This is where you being trust worthy in one area does not mean you are trust worthy about this comes into play again.
5) You absolutely are putting profit over lives even if you convince yourself the lives don’t matter for whatever reason.
The persecution complex of the petty bourgeois truly knows no bounds…
So just to be clear, you’re all giving up your cell phones, tablets, x boxes and what not, right? Because way more people have died trying to find, mine and protect what they mine of the rare earth elements that those things need than have ever died on the streets of Cambridge. I mean if we want to talk about preserving lives and all. Oh wait, I’m sorry. Poor people in Africa aren’t all that important to you if they die trying to ensure that you have what you want.
You are writing this on the internet. If you believe giving it all up is the moral choice necessary to make any other moral choices than you can do that.
Street parking is a government- and society-sponsored giveaway that cities have been passing to retail stores and car owners for several generations, for free or for very little. Even in the most expensive real estate markets in the world (New York! San Francisco! Boston!), upwards of 1/4 of all urban space is asphalt, set aside just for parking.
City planners and voters are learning from research, experiments, and from other countries that this car-centric choice doesn’t benefit urban societies in so many ways: pollution, street safety for both pedestrians and children, traffic, space for other ventures, etc… the list goes on. All across the country, this giveaway is starting to change, in favor of funding and growing public transit, alternative mobility options, reduced housing and commercial construction costs (by reducing or removing parking quotas), etc.
Suing to keep this entitlement is what many business owners will do, to maintain this advantage and implicit income. There will be cases where some businesses have to close or change, and maybe the city could have planned or compensated them better. But the alternative is keeping a system that’s worse, for the benefit of a few.
This entitlement never belonged to businesses and car owners anyway — it was an artificial choice that Cambridge made for some time. Let’s remember that, and be grateful for the gift that was had — instead of grumbling as it leaves.