MAIN STORY
YOU CAN’T TALK ABOUT NYC FOOD WITHOUT TALKING ABOUT WHO GETS ACCESS
There is no lack of good food in NYC. But we are lacking equal access to it.
The fantasy is that everything is everywhere, all the time. It’s not. Your ZIP code decides your options before your taste ever gets the chance.
Walk downtown and you get choice, quality, abundance. Walk parts of the Bronx or eastern Queens and you get scarcity dressed up as convenience. We aren’t talking about different tastes. The infrastructure is failing us.
It’s all about proximity, pricing, and who the system was built for.
Fresh food costing more than junk, groceries requiring a commute, entire neighborhoods left with nothing but a corner store… the problem is having a food desert where you least expect it.
This impacts everything: what people cook, what kids grow up eating, which businesses survive.
New York didn’t lose its food culture. It just stopped distributing it fairly.
FEATURED STORY
NY'ERS SAY THEY SUPPORT SMALL BUSINESS — UNTIL THEY ORDER DELIVERY
No one hates small businesses, especially not New Yorkers. We just aren’t choosing them when it counts.
We love the idea of supporting local. We post about it, talk about it, build our identity around it. But the second we smell convenience, that loyalty goes out the window.
Open your favorite delivery app and suddenly you forget about the neighborhood spot. It’s about speed, discounts, and whoever is paying the app most to be promoted.
Here’s what no one wants to hear: restaurants losing up to 30% per order to third party platforms. This is not sustainable.
The same places you say you love are working harder for less every time you order through an app. Break the habit.
Before you think it isn’t on you, be honest.
WHAT PUSHES YOU TO ORDER DELIVERY?
SECONDARY STORIES
THE WORLD CUP IS COMING TO NEW YORK, BUT SMALL BUSINESSES MAY NEVER SEE THE MONEY Unless the city activates neighborhoods, those 5M spenders will stay in Manhattan sponsor zones and only inflate corporate revenue. Read the full story →
DON’T OVERPAY FOR YOUR DUMPLINGS: CHOW DOWN AT CHINATOWN’S BEST (AND CHEAPEST) INSTEAD You’re walking past the best food in the city. $30 dumplings is crazy. Chinatown is still feeding people for $5. Read the full story →
NOWON VS RAOUL'S One burger is loud, messy, and built to take over your table. The other still makes you earn it at the bar like it’s 2005. We’ve picked the winner. Read the full story →
PAY ATTENTION
The system is telling you something.
Access is a signal.
Convenience is a signal.
Your defaults are signals.
This is a shift in behavior, not appetite.
Restaurants will either adapt or get squeezed.
Customers will either act differently or keep pretending.
Keep your eyes open.
