Help Us Rebuild Southside, Chicago

Right now, we have set rents at the level at which we can earn a reasonable return that will cover all our costs while at the same time providing opportunity for local folks to get a business off the ground. Generally, that means that the rent that we charge is probably 20% to 30% below what a comparable rent might be that’s going after a Starbucks or an AT&T. Our tenants automatically pay higher rents as their businesses grow and they can support higher payments, but we need to make sure they can afford to get started. Our rent agreements have a volume component. There’s a trigger point generally set to wherever we think is a break even point for the operator. After that break even point, we share in some percentage of profit.

We expect our partners to come in with the experience required to operate their particular concept. We are able to provide back of the house management assistance in key support areas, including finance, marketing, permitting & licensing, and human resources management.

This centralized support approach significantly reduces the failure risk of the restaurant as it provides professionals to handle functions that the typical cook or restaurateur doesn’t like and often isn’t very good at. For example, the Jerk Shack is a small restaurant but it benefits from being part of a larger entity that provides these key services in an efficient manner, where real expertise can be brought to bear.

We are currently looking for operating partners for our next set of three culinary venues in our Bronzeville Cookin’ project. These partners should have a strong track record in managing a small to medium-size culinary enterprise, along with deep experience and credibility in some specific area. They should have a strong connection to Bronzeville, a passion for community revitalization, and a commitment to working within a broader team towards that end. And they should be able to contribute some resources towards acquiring an equity share in the enterprise.

We have begun to work on a vegetarian café concept that will use a celebration of the diverse and delicious "green" cuisines from Black communities across the world to invite key health-, faith- and environment-conscious food consumers to Bronzeville Cookin'. This includes members of certain faith communities such as Seventh-day Adventists, Muslims, and Hebrew Israelites, health-conscious professionals, and a growing group of gardeners and environmentalists.

We are also exploring concepts around southern cuisine and the produce used in the Black Kitchen, however we have the flexibility to consider powerful concepts that explore other types of Black cuisine.

Resources!

We are being hamstrung by the City of Chicago's decision to hold back $2 million of their $3 million commitment to Bronzeville Cookin' until the project is more than 90% complete, from a financial perspective.

In addition, Illinois EPA owes us over $180,000 in reimbursement for work that we completed a year ago. They have approved the invoice but we haven't been paid because the state has not yet passed a spending plan for 2016.

The Bronzeville Jerk Shack, launched September 2015, is our celebration of delicious Jamaican street cuisine and the spirit of the island! Our first restaurant venue and, at around 750 sq. ft., our smallest space, it is open 11a-9p everyday except for major holidays. Menu items are priced so that virtually everyone can afford a meal, if not every day, then certainly once or twice a week.

The Jerk Shack has had great impact in a number of different ways. It has significantly expanded access to quality food. It is the only sit-down restaurant, other than a Subway franchise, located within a half-mile of the 51st Street CTA transit hub.

It is building community. It has become a local gathering point for informal get-togethers and regular meetings of neighborhood groups. The most normal of things in other communities.

Our favorite unplanned-encounter-leading-to-triple-win result: a Bronzeville Cookin' team member lunching with a mining company project leader pondering his assignment to plant seedlings to sequester CO2 as part of his company's sustainability program. A few discussions later we have an agreement to plant 100 trees across three Bronzeville locations, with greater carbon impact, and transformative street level potential.

We are employing our young people: 7 at last count, with more needed as the temperature rises. All Southsiders. A couple as a first job. All excited to be a part of it.

We've garnered great recognition. Patrons love our food, our garage door and other decor, and hard-to-get specialties like festival and jerk pork. And being pronounced the best Jerk Chicken in Chicago by Chicago's leading free daily newspaper 6 months after opening is a great honor.

Profitability - not so quick, but not surprising given the missionary work required to bring Chicago back to 51st Street. We're making progress and expect to start making money sometime this summer.

Our goal is to use cuisine and culture to create locally-based enterprises that deliver valuable amenities and provide jobs, thereby attracting the spending of residents and visitors and revitalizing historic Bronzeville.

The community garden, opened in August 2010, is our first community service initiative. We wanted to transform a space that, like thousands of other vacant lots, was blighted, an eyesore, and nothing but a drag on our community.

It is much more than a garden. It is a games facility - probably the most popular outdoor game space on the mid-South Side. It is an art gallery, with works ranging from original mosaic pieces to a large scale photomural, rough hewn street furniture, and two mixed-media totems. It is an event space, mainly informal by neighbors but also subject to drafted into use by major community organizations.

Mostly it is a platform for bringing together people from different walks of life. This is hard, and urban gardening is challenging, but we work at it every day and when we succeed it brings great value.

Bronzeville Bikes is a community bicycling initiative built around a one-of-a-kind refurbished 20 ft. shipping container - the BikeBox - located at the north west corner of 51st Street and Calumet Avenue. Opened in 2014, the BikeBox is Bronzeville's first bike shop, offering "express" bike repair and refurbished bicycles for sale. It is also the site for the popular Sister Cycles repair program for women and a soon-to-be-established sister program for youth and the starting point for our long-established Celebrate Bronzeville Sunday bike rides.

Bronzeville Bikes has two simple goals: to get Bronzeville residents on bikes, and to invite all Chicagoland cyclists to visit Bronzeville. Cyclists eat.

The Bronzeville Incubator is a co-working space, enterprise incubator, and event space designed to bring together a cadre of local business people, professionals, and social entrepreneurs who need high quality space and share an interest in community revitalization through commerce.

Initial incubation efforts will focus on culinary enterprises affiliated with the Bronzeville Cookin and The Forum initiatives, as well as with several other South Side projects desiring to incorporate strong culinary offerings.

Periodic skill building and networking fora will connect Incubator members and visitors with professionals and specialized resources from across the region.

The incubator is expected to complete the permitting process and open in Summer 2016.

Our biggest risk is negative preconceptions by potential patrons that prevent them from visiting. This preconceptions might be about crime in the community or about a fear that poor quality of the offering might make the trip not worthwhile. Perception can become reality. If such preconceptions are allowed to linger they will reduce patronage and the reduced revenues are likely to reduce the scope and quality of any community offering.

We're working to address this risk in several ways. First, we are focusing our efforts on two key locations adjacent to transit hubs on 43rd Street and 51st. This gives us the opportunity to create a critical mass of activities better able to withstand business challenges and it decrease patrons' cost of access. Second, we work intensively within our team to put in place the mindset and systems to deliver consistently excellent offerings. Third, we work with a broad set of partners to engage and beautify our community and thereby improve public safety for all. For example, we have recently launched a tree planting initiative that could reshape the look and feel of the 51st Street retail corridor and, in the process, bring together key stakeholders.