Oxygen bar and tea house Breathe, Drink and Design at 416 E. Seventh Street has closed, saying the loss of business due to the modern-street-car project and the summer slow-down was too much to bear. From the place’s Facebook account:
Hey everyone. Just wanted to thank everyone for your patronage and support throughout the last year. Unfortunately, we closed our doors at the end of this past month. It just got a little tough to keep the business going through all of the construction on 4th Ave. and we figured that it would be especially tough during the Summer with all the students out of town. These things happen, though.
But, hey… you never know when we might just get the crazy notion to do this again! So, what we want to say is “Thank you, and goodbye for now!”
Have a wonderful day, friends!
To be fair, one cannot overtly blame the construction downtown for this closure being that the success rate of a business model dealing chiefly in tea and oxygen has yet to be proven. That said, the construction surely did nothing to help the business out, and here’s hoping we don’t see more shuttered businesses before the construction dust clears.
This article appears in May 31 – Jun 6, 2012.
Hardly a streetcar casualty. The one and only time I walked into the place, out of curiosity, I predicted they’d be closed within 6 months.
Pay money for air? I think not.
And then there’s all the hot weather we’ve been having. What genius dreamed up THAT idea?
It is unfortunate that some businesses were not prepared for the construction. They should have taken advantage of the RTA’s Mainstreet program that was funded by taxpayers to help businesses survive the construction.
It would have been ok if it was a subway…………..
It could be the fact that oxygen is still free
Dang it! This is the first time I’ve heard of Breathe and it’s closed already. I find the effects of breathing high oxygen very good for my poor head. Sounds like it was a sweet place. So sorry it closed. Here’s to (deep breath) seeing them back sometime in the future.
“MainStreet’s free consulting services include an informational liaison, a construction ombudsman and general business consulting.”
And this takes care of the problems of access and significant loss of business how?
There should have been DIRECT MONETARY SUPPORT in the form of no interest loans or grants for the businesses effected by the construction — chump change out of the $190 million (and growing?) cost of this project.
Of course, that would have been necessary only if the developer’s friends who run the RTA wanted 4th Avenue to remain funky and nice instead of the form of “urban renewal with a happy face” that the city seems to be practicing.
We in the Grant Road corridor are also facing the destruction of our quality of life in favor of this new form of “urban renewal”… we sure as HELL don’t need a 6 lane Grant Road as a “new urban commercial destination” now that we’ve reached Peak Oil!
Never heard of the place, although I frequently am in the 4th Avenue area for food or shopping. The location on 7th Street looks obviously off the beaten path, and I wonder how good the business model may have been in the current economic environment.