Quantcast

The DNAinfo archives brought to you by WNYC.
Read the press release here.

PODCAST: A Cherished Mom-and-Pop's Key to Outlasting the Big-Boxes

By Emily Frost | February 10, 2016 3:28pm
 The store has operated as a family business for 116 years. 
Beacon Paint & Hardware
View Full Caption

UPPER WEST SIDE — There's a main reason people pick a mom-and-pop shop over a chain store — the customer service.

But then there are a dozen little touches that keep people loyal, according to the Stark family, who has been running the 116-year-old Beacon Paint & Hardware since 1971. 

The "lifers" know they'll get friendly, personal service, said Bruce Stark, who co-owns the store with his brother, Steven. They are also joined by other family members in running the store, including their sister Ellen, who keeps the books.

"I think our store is best known for being very dog- and kid-friendly. You can't go to the big-box store and let your child sit and play with Bru [the Starks' black lab] or just visit with us in the office," Ellen Stark said.

"If it is not too busy, we try and help the parents when they are shopping by playing with the kids or sometimes we have crayons and paper for them to use." 

She also often brings baked goods to customers made by her daughter.

Beacon has weathered many changes through the years — from when it was surrounded by pimps and Amsterdam Avenue was a no-go for many residents, to the disappearance of small shops in favor of chains.

Bruce and Steven sat down with DNAinfo to talk about these changes and their customers through the years, why Lowe's doesn't scare them, how the city can help small businesses and why they look forward to big snowstorms. 

Emily: So I want to start out with the 116th anniversary that you're celebrating this year. Congratulations.

Bruce: Thank you very much.

Steven: Thank you.

Emily: How did you get to 116 years? What's the story behind that?

Bruce: Well, the Beacon Paint was founded in 1900 and in 1971 the original family sold it to our father. Our grandfather, who also had a paint store in New York City, knew the original family. Appropriately enough, the original family, the owner in 1900, lived on Broadway and 98th Street. His sons lived on 79th and Amsterdam and Steven and I are both Upper Westsiders also so we kept it in the family in a sense.

Emily: Yeah.

Bruce: And my father's had it now since 1971 and we've just been here the whole time.

Emily: The store, when it was founded 116 years ago was at this location?

Bruce: No, actually it was across the street on the west side of the avenue and in 1940, this used to be a grocery store, A and P, they moved out and we came across the street. The back of the store where we are now is where they kept, where A and P kept the horse and buggy to make milk deliveries. There was a man who came into the store who used to live on 78th street who told me all of this. He was the box boy there. I have very accurate information about what happened.

Emily: Your father, you said he was involved in paint, but what made him want to get involved in the hardware business?

Bruce: Paint and hardware are just a natural extension of each other so originally this was a paint and wallpaper store with no hardware and many art supplies. Up until the early '70s, the Upper West Side was artists. It was a phenomenal art store.

Emily: When did you two get involved? You said you took over from your dad at some point.

Bruce: I came in when I was 14 which was 1971, the first summer that I could work here, I did and I've been here ever since.

Steven: I came in, I guess around the same time. 15 years ago I came here full time. I was previously a journalist and I left that career and came here.

Emily: Was that a hard decision for you?

Steven: Yes, it was and it was a difficult transition but after about 6 months I got used to it and you know, I have never looked back. I never missed journalism at all.

Emily: Do any of the same skills extend to how you engage with people?

Steven: Not so much in the store but when I go out on sales calls, especially cold calls, it's not unlike when you had to go to somebody's house and ask them for an interview. Sometimes it was bad news, it was, "Hi, I know your son or daughter just got killed in a car accident. Do you have a minute to talk and give me a photo, and make it fast. I'm on a deadline." If I could do that, I could go to somebody and at worst get a no for trying to sell them something.

Emily: Yeah.

Steven: That seems rather easy in retrospect.

Emily: What's a typical day for you, Steven?

Steven: There's no typical day.

Emily: Okay. Every day is different?

Steven: There are a lot of incoming requests for pricing from our institutional accounts. We serve a lot of hotels here in the city. We're often on the, I'm often on the counter or doing sales work or checking merchandise in or getting deliveries out and putting together price quotes, putting together orders, searching the Internet or with my suppliers for various items that we don't have at our fingertips.

Emily: I didn't know you worked with hotels. What does that involve?

Steven: Well, we work with the directors of engineering at about 50 hotels here in the city, budget properties, boutique hotels, four and five star properties and we sell them everything from paint to the hardware to odds and ends, you know, weird items. Thank goodness to the Internet because prior to that I don't know how I would have found half, 90 percent of these items. Sometimes I'm armed only with a photograph and I have to try to track it down. I'll often take pictures with my cell phone at a location or they will be, people email me, "can you find this?" They don't have any other information so I have to try to ...

Emily: Have like one picture.

Steven: ... I have to try to figure out what it is. Through repetition I've gotten really good at it.

Emily: So, you're kind of like a paint detective?

Steven: I guess. Yeah, sort of and it's very rare that I say, " I just can't get that." Or it may be that it's so much trouble and the payoff isn't there, the time to invest, but I make the effort. I don't like just saying, "no, I can't do that." I never throw my hands up and say, "I can't get that." Because what can't you get, really?

Emily: So you like the hunt?

Steven: Yes.

Emily: Bruce, what about you?

Bruce: When I did what he did, before the Internet, we had maybe two suppliers and if those two didn't have it, we couldn't get it. There was no access to go and finding something that we didn't carry so in essence, my job was quite easy. As far as my normal day-

Emily: It's a yes or a no.

Bruce: Yeah, exactly. I'm usually here between 6:30 and 7:00 a.m. ...

Emily: Well, that's early.

Bruce: And I run the day to day operations and I'm on the counter most of the day helping people and just overseeing everything.

Emily: So, in terms of your customers, do you have a lot of the same customers? 

Bruce: Yes, something that we always prided ourselves on, I'd always said when I was a kid that, you know Amsterdam Avenue wasn't a great street, you didn't know about it. It wasn't like 86th Street, oh well that's where it is, or 72nd or 79th. It wasn't a cross street and it didn't have a good name. You didn't want to be on Amsterdam for the most part back in those days but I always felt that if we could get the customer to the store once, we'd have them for life and we have lifers. We have people that we know from back in the early '70s still coming in here and shopping, loyal customers, friends that are always here and we try to encourage newer people to be loyal customers.

Emily: So, Amsterdam back in the day, '70s, '80s, why was it a place that nobody wanted to come?

Bruce: The whole Upper, the entire Upper West Side was not a desirable place, There were many SROs and flop houses, seedy bars, things like that. It wasn't a great neighborhood. Even when we got here, our next door neighbors, two places: one a depot for the sanitation workers and at lunch hours garbage trucks would be triple parked on Amsterdam. They'd be there for the entire lunch hour and then the guys would get back in there and go and then they'd come back later on and change their clothes. That wouldn't last five minutes today. Even when, if a garbage truck pulls up and the guy goes across the street to get a bagel, I'm watching wondering when he's going to leave. You know, so it's kind of a different area.

Early '70s there was a place next door to us that was called, "Hair-dos by Dot". (There was also a pillow store there) and they didn't do anybody's hair, it was just a hangout for pimps.

Emily: So, it was kind of a front?

Bruce: It was a front and they just hung out there and they happened to be the nicest neighbors we ever had. Every time we needed a parking spot, they pulled their car out. They never had a cross word with each other, they just hung out there and relaxed and were friendly people but today I don't think you would see that on the street.

Emily: No, and so you had to draw them in past the garbage, past the pimps.

Bruce: Past the pimps. Exactly, exactly.

Emily: How did you do that?

Bruce: We just always preached customer service. Always help people. You come in the store, you're going to be asked, "can I help you?" And we had product knowledge and were honest so we're proud of those things and that's the way it's always been.

Emily: You talked about, you have some newer customers now. Who are these new customers?

Bruce: Younger people, family people. They know more things from the Internet now that our suppliers even are on the Internet, they can find out products before we can sometimes. It's embarrassing and annoying. I complain to them all the time, but there was a time where we had a months' knowledge of something before it came out onto the market. Now, people come in, "do you have this item?" And they've already got the information because they're scouring the Internet looking for things. So, people are more product savvy.

Emily: Between say the '80s and '90s and now, are there things that you never anticipated that you would be stocking that customers are asking for?

Bruce: In the early '90s, we started selling air conditioners. In the 1980s, we never would've thought of that. Every year we're out on the Amsterdam Avenue street festival. There was a time where we never wanted to do that because we thought, "we're a paint store". No one is going to buy paint at a street fair. They're going for the food, they're going for this or that and we've got to carry the paint. But once we had air conditioners and fans and housewares and hardware and tools, we put everything on display and it's a whole different world. That was Steve's idea and he ran with it and we did great with it and it's an excellent idea.

Emily: There is a DIY, do-it-yourself movement afoot that's been going for a little while now. Has that helped your business?

Bruce: Oh sure.

Emily: How so?

Bruce: People are buying things, although we also have a lot of people who have contractors do the work now. There was a time when DIY was much bigger.

Emily: Really? When was that?

Bruce: Maybe in the '80s or the '90s but now I see more people who have someone to do it for them.

Steven: Yeah, I remember we used to rent certain tools like floor sander would go out frequently and we had to explain to the guy or woman, you know here is how you do it and we'd go out frequently. We hardly ever rent it anymore because someone says, "I'm not going to do that. I'll get somebody else to do it for me."

Emily: So you're dealing with a lot with contractors who come in.

Bruce: We deal with some contractors. Supers do the work for people these days, a lot of handy men in the buildings.

Emily: Do you think there are more owners on the Upper West Side now than renters?

Bruce: Oh sure.

Emily: How has that affected things?

Bruce: They have more disposable income, but then again they also, instead of doing it themselves, they might hire the contractor who's going to buy it elsewhere. We don't have a chance there sometimes.

Emily: Where are those contractors going?

Bruce: They may come in from Queens or Jersey or some place else where they have a place near where they live ...

Emily: Right.

Bruce: ... and they're used to buying it out there. Some even go to the big boxes.

Emily: Since you brought up the big boxes, you know now we have Lowe's in Lincoln Square. What are your thoughts on that when you first heard it was going in versus — you know it's been there for a little while now — so maybe you can talk about what the expectation was verses reality.

Bruce: We weren't happy with it but I've had a couple of people tell me every time they've been in there, it's been empty. I know one person who says, "They're not going to be here in a few years. You guys will be here but they won't be here." And to think of a big giant like Lowe's, they're the number two or number three retailer in the country. Not everybody knows how to handle New York. We do, we can handle it. They may have bitten off more than they can chew there. I hope so. That's maybe a pipe dream but we've been here 116 years. Hopefully, we'll be here another 116 years.

Emily: Have you noticed any difference in sales or has anybody come in and said, "oh I tried to find this at Lowe's and I couldn't"? Or ...

Bruce: We've had a few people who have said they were going to try Lowe's for something we didn't have. I've seen a couple people come in with bags but not a lot of people. Only a handful. Maybe three or four people have had shopping bags from Lowe's, which is a happy surprise, I'll tell you that.

Emily: So, it hasn't been a catastrophe at all.

Bruce: It hasn't been a catastrophe there.

Emily: Do you think part of that is that people on the Upper West Side like to stick to their, you know, ten block range?

Bruce: Very much. People here are very-

Emily: So, the people living in the [West] 70s and 80s are not going to go to 68th Street?

Bruce: I think people on the Upper West Side are very loyal and they're very much in favor of the small store but somebody's going to those big stores and that's taking business away from us.

Emily: So you're trying to rope in the newer people that maybe don't have that history?

Bruce: We would love to, yes. Yeah, we've got to introduce ourselves to newer people everyday.

Emily: I noticed on the outside of your store, you're really representing the history, the 166 years. Why do you think that's important that people recognize that?

Steven: Because it's more rare than ever. That's the main reason. To have a business around that long is something to celebrate and with a lot of stores having gone out, we're still here.

Emily: Were there stores that left that particularly made you sad?

Bruce: A number of them. We were very friendly with the guys who ran the deli on the corner, the pizza places are gone — where do you get a good slice of pizza on the Upper West Side now? — and all the small stores. There used to be a shoe repair guy a half block up the road. Where do you go to get certain things? It's not easy to find things. All the big stores that are coming in are these chains, salad bars all over the place.

Emily: Do you guys own this building? How is it that you don't have that problem of the suddenly sky-rocketing rent?

Bruce: Well, we do. The rent is probably, I'd have to say it's fair. Our landlord, the Bruscoe Family, we get a long very well with them. We've dealt with them for years. They own this building and now they gave us a new five-year lease. Thanks to them, we're here and it was a fair rate. I can't complain one single bit and neither could anybody else who look at numbers for anything around here. Now, if we bought the building, things would be a lot different but when my father bought the store in 971, the landlord wanted to sell us the store and the highest rent was $50.00 an apartment. Everything else was $25.00 and even some $10.00 apartments and two years later the oil crisis exploded and that would have been everything, so it was a good thing at that time that we didn't buy, knowing sort of, what with the changes that were coming.

Even the guys who have had the buildings for so many years, nobody saw this, nobody was buying in anticipation of that happening. People, a lot of building owners on the Upper West Side bought to have a building, to own property, not because in 20 years it could be valuable, it's going to be worth millions.

Emily: They didn't see that coming.

Bruce: You could have bought any brownstone on the Upper West Side for $5,000 or $10,000 and now they go for $5 or $10 million but nobody said, "yeah, let's go get it."

Emily: Right.

Bruce: ... "let's go pick up a half dozen."

Emily: Investment. Yeah.

Bruce: Yeah, it was not seen.

Emily: It was just, "well, let's own rather than rent."

Bruce: Yeah.

Emily: Not invest and live somewhere else.

Bruce: I asked my personal landlord some years ago, I said, "did you see this coming?" He goes, "nobody saw it coming. It was not coming. It was not on it's way." Now you look for the next up and coming neighborhood. Back then he says, "nah, we just bought it to have property and to have a place to live for our family. That was it."

Emily: What do you think the city could be doing better to to help mom and pops? Are there policy changes that you would like to see?

Bruce: Rent control. My landlord will hit me for that one, but rent control or at least not necessarily control but a certain limit that it could be done. Now you have to three and four months security. You have to have a lot of money to invest just to begin with, but if there's some sort of a limit, some sort of an arbitration panel, something to help the merchants stay, that's going to be helpful.

Emily: Some sort of limit to the increase ...

Bruce: Something.

Emily: ... like not a 300 percent increase.

Bruce: Correct. Something like that would be an answer. It certainly has to be fair to the landlords so they get what they have to have but yeah, that would keep, in terms of keeping a small store.

Emily: So, touching on another issue related to Amsterdam Avenue, the bike lane was approved but how do you guys feel about that? The protected bike lane would run right past your store.

Bruce: The problem is that it takes away another lane of traffic. If my truck has to be on the other side of the street to load up or take something off the delivery truck, it takes that much longer to walk back and forth, they have to watch out for the bicycles, of course they have to watch out for the people, they have to wait for the traffic to change. All that takes time. Less lanes of traffic, it's going to take longer to get a delivery to you. We may not even be able to get it the same day or the next day and that slows up everything. That hurts sales because now people are going to maybe get it elsewhere close to where they are and the minute one guy double parks or there's an accident, you're down to one lane of traffic. You see it on Columbus all the time.

Bruce: 7:00 a.m. in the morning, one lane of traffic where people are getting to work but it's just so difficult. Another street would be a better street. There's major thoroughfare for trucks and buses and any just limiting the amount of traffic that's going to get through and they-

Emily: How many deliveries do you get? Do you get a delivery a day?

Bruce: We get anywhere from two to four deliveries a day.

Emily: So, what are people mainly bringing in, is that paint?

Bruce: Paint, paint supplies, another supplier will bring in hardware, another one will bring in light bulbs, another one will bring in housewares and each one of them can only put so much on a hand truck and go back and forth and back and forth and that will take up more time and someone's going, sooner or later they have to pay for that.

Emily: So the fact that you're on the east side, that's a little bit more helpful?

Bruce: Yes, because the bike lane is going to be on the west side. You know, just stepping into the road for a second, you've got to be so vigilant because a biker can come flying by. I've been a victim of that. Granted, I haven't always paid attention when I've stepped into the bike lane but I've learned when I almost got hit, I better watch and it's going to be very dangerous for people.

Emily: Let's talk about the recent snow storm and how snow storms affect your business. You guys sell this classic sled combination, right? What happens here when it snows and the city's shut down?

Steven: We love it.

Bruce: We love it. It's excellent for business. We have-

Emily: Is it? Why is that?

Steven: It's great.

Bruce: We sell calcium chloride and we sell shovels and gloves and mops and everything that is associated with weather-related sales. The more snow, the better it is. Granted, we have to shovel or we get our cars stuck but we supply anyone who needs it. The sleds, we started a number of years ago, we had a mixing bucket that contractors would use to mix plaster but it's also great for a four or five-year old kid to sit in and there was a woman who came in, the family had just moved into New York City and it was the end of March.

It was a snow storm that day. Her husband went to work and said, "You get the kids in New York City in the snow." She happened to live on 88th Street. They came in here and she didn't know anything or anywhere to go or what to do and what are you going to do with the kids on a day like that? The TV wasn't even set up in their home and I had put together the bucket, I drilled some holes in the side and put a rope on there for her to pull the kid. He is in his early 20s now and we're still friendly and we became instant friends that day and all she did was drag him from here to 80th Street. Didn't have to find a hill, didn't have to find the park that, she didn't know where Central Park was that day, pulled him along the street. He had the time of his life. As I said, we've been friends ever since.

Emily: Only a matter of time before he brings his own kid in here ...

Bruce: Yeah, hopefully, you know ...

Emily: ... and set up the sled.

Bruce: ... and now we do it for other people that ask specifically, "Do you have sleds?" "No we've got something better if you got a small kid." We have had sleds sometimes and they come and go.

Emily: So you guys stock up well ahead of a storm.

Bruce: We try to.

Steven: Sometimes.

Bruce: Try to catch it right.

Steven: We'll pay attention to the weather.

Emily: How do you gauge it?

Bruce: Every minute we're watching the news and the weather reports and seeing what's going to happen.

Emily: So you're glued to the weather?

Steven: There was a couple or, three years ago there was a major storm and we ran out of snow melt so quickly that, I think it was he got in the truck and drove in this blizzard to Long Island to our supplier's warehouse and took another of what they call, a pallet of this snow melt, maybe 50 bags and while he was coming back I was getting orders over the phone from some hotels. So, on the way back instead of coming straight back he would drop 10 bags here and 10 bags there and it was pretty crazy.

Emily: So it was worth that dangerous trip to Long Island?

Bruce: Oh it was worth it, yes. Yes.

Emily: Yeah. So in the recent storm you guys did well?

Steven: Yeah.

Emily: That's interesting you know ...

Bruce: We could use another storm.

Bruce: You know, one or two more storms would be very nice for business.

Emily: Yeah.

Steven: Sometimes it's just the threat and that's good enough to get ...

Emily: Right.

Steven: ... the retail and the hotel customers or the property management companies to say, "we need some [supplies.]"

Emily: Then a hot summer?

Bruce: That also, Steve's been building a weather machine in his home trying to alter the weather.

Steven: It's not going so well. I think ...

Bruce: Can't get it out of the apartments. 

Steven: ... the earth keeps warming up and I didn't put a reverse button on it so.

Emily: So you guys are very community oriented. You do a lot of community service. Can you tell me about that?

Bruce: We love the community. I think the community loves us. We live in the community. Our pride and joy is a walk-a-thon that we've done for, now this will be the 15th year that we do it. It's a walk that we do at night. This will be the 5th year in a row that we're doing it for the benefit of Guiding Eyes for the Blind. It will be at Columbus and 77th Street inside the schoolyard on May 2nd and we invite everybody from the neighborhood and we take a little walk from Columbus and 77th into Central Park, down to 67th Street and then back. We've had our Borough President, Gale Brewer, has been there, Helen Rosenthal, the Councilwoman, Linda Rosenthal, the Assemblywoman has been there. On occasion, Scott Stringer, the Comptroller has come. We get the police to block traffic for us to walk across the street.

Emily: Why the Guiding Light organization?

Bruce: The Guiding Light for the Blind provides guide dogs to blind people at absolutely no charge to them and our sister was blind and she had two guide dogs from them and it was always something that was very near and dear to us. A lot of the neighborhood businesses, Levain Bakery, Chirping Chicken, Pizzeria Uno, Amsterdam Deli right on the corner of 79th and Amsterdam, they all donate food for us. TD Bank gives us very nice gift bags but we also a do a lot for the school. 

Emily: For P.S. 87?

Bruce: P.S. 87, not just P.S. 87, but every school around that asks. Every year for the school auction we donate what we call our "bucket o' tools" which is a bucket with a whole lot of different tools in there that people love. Either guys want to buy for themselves or sometimes women buy it for their husbands or sometimes the husbands buy it for their wives and it's been a hot item. Everybody loves it. I was at one auction for the Computer School and there was a husband and wife there and he said, "honey, look. They've got the bucket again." She goes, "But you bought it last year." He goes, "Yes, but this is the newer model." I've got at least four schools that we've already promised to.

Steven: When you talk about the community ...

Emily: Yeah.

Steven: ... we also, we've always been kid and dog friendly.

Emily: Right.

Steven: You know many people in this neighborhood have children. We give out balloons to the kids. As I said, we've always been friendly to dogs but especially when I got my dog just about, almost 12 years ago, I didn't want to leave it at home all day and my brother said, "so bring it here." So she's been coming here since she was two months old and she's an attraction. People come in to say hi to her.

Emily: This is Bru?

Steven: This is Bru, my black lab.

Emily: Who is Bru named after?

Steven: Bruce.

Emily: Bruce.

Steven: People come in just to say hi to her. They bring their dogs in. They don't even buy anything sometimes, the dogs bring them here. It's their morning stop, their daily stop. Kids come in. There used to be a kid who everyday before school had to come in and say hi to Bru. Her mother's like, "Come on. We have to go now. You're going to be late." And everyday had to hug Bru.

Emily: Got to make that stop.

Steven: Yeah.

Bruce: Somebody else said it was the only way they get their kid out on time. She'd go, "if you get out of bed now and get ready, we'll go and say hello to Bru. Otherwise, you don't."

Emily: Aww.

Bruce: The father told me, he said, "Thank God for Bru."

Steven: We have a bucket, a never empty bucket of treats.

Emily: So this is just the friendliest lab?

Steven: She is.

Emily: I'm siting next to her and she's very sweet.

Steven: She'll lay down out there and that's her, she's got many perches here. In fact, I'm sitting in her chair.

Bruce: We tried to put duct tape on it where it was ripping, she wouldn't sit on it for three days. We took off the tape, she got back on it.

Steven: Sometimes, she'll be laying there and all of a sudden I'll hear her tail go crazy and it's some little kid come in to say hi to her.

Emily: That's really nice.

Steven: She'll just lay there like this, like, "just keep petting me. I'm good. I'm good. I'm good."

Emily: Well, have there been any crazy moments at the store, you know since 1971, no robberies, no-

Bruce: Thank God no. We were broken into at night twice in the early '70s. It was a gang that seemed to hit almost every other store. Once they were arrested and caught, we've had nothing. I think because of the size of our store and that we have different aisles that somebody could be. If you come in, you don't know where somebody could be. We have cameras here in the office so somebody could be up in the register, they may not want to come in here. Thank God. We're lucky like that. It's a good neighborhood, we're lucky like that too.

Steven: You know, on a similar but different topic, I remember on 9/11 a number of people were coming in for things that they could donate for the clean up efforts, masks and gloves and what have you, but I do remember in particular, a firefighter from Ladder 25 on West 77th Street coming in and I think this was still the day of, still going on, and we just gave him every disposable dusk mask, here, take it, go. I'm pretty sure that guy lost his life that day and I don't remember his name but I can picture him.

Emily: Yeah, so you're helping to keep this a family, a community neighborhood.

Bruce: Yes, I think we do a pretty good job of it.

Emily: What are your hopes for the neighborhood and the store?

Bruce: We hope to continue for another 116 years. We just re-signed the new lease for 5 more years ...

Emily: Mm-hmm.

Bruce: ... and then we'll look for another 5 after that and keep on going until we're at that age where we'll have to look to somebody else.

Emily: Yeah.

Bruce: We'll worry about that then though, but we hope to be here for a long time.

Emily: So you two aren't looking at successors anytime soon?

Bruce: Not right now. We don't have any siblings to take over so we're going to have to find somebody or, not siblings but any children.

Emily: Mm-hmm.

Bruce: So, no family members are coming in. As the previous owners found us, I'm sure we'll find somebody.

Emily: It sounds like it won't be for awhile.

Bruce: Hopefully, not for another 20 years or so.

Steven: A lot of people have expressed those sentiments to us.

Emily: Really?

Steven: If they see a store go out, they'll say like, "oh thank God you're still here." Or "please tell me you're not going anywhere."

Emily: It gives people a lot of anxiety.

Steven: Yes, it does.

Bruce: Steve went to the community board meeting last month ...

Steven: Yeah, it was at the same one you were at.

Bruce: ... and just by announcing who he was and where he was from, he got a round of applause.

Steven: You remember?

Emily: Yeah, that's right.

Bruce: He said, "we're Beacon Paint and we've been here 116 years" and people were applauding, which is very nice to hear.

Emily: Well, thanks for talking with me.

Bruce: Our pleasure.

Steven: It's a pleasure

Emily: Thank you.

Subscribe to DNAinfo's Upper West Side podcast: