Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: New York is constantly reinventing itself, but some of the most interesting transformations aren't happening in plain sight. Along the Brooklyn waterfront sits Industry City. Once a massive industrial complex, now a place where food, art, manufacturing and creativity all collide under one roof. But how does something like that actually happen? Who decides what it becomes and what it doesn't?
Today, I'm sitting down with someone who's been right in the middle of all that story, Jim Somoza, managing director at Industry City, to talk about the past, the vision and the future of one of the most unique spaces in New York City. But above all else, Jim is a New Yorker.
Ladies and gentlemen, the next Brooklyn bound train in Valheim. Stand clear of the closing doors, please.
[00:01:03] Speaker B: This is con square on disney street.
Transfer is available to the shuttle to Grand Central.
[00:01:22] Speaker A: Hello, everyone and welcome to the New Yorkers, a podcast by New York City Cop. I am your host, Kelly Kopp, published photographer, New York City tour business owner, content creator, podcaster, and above all else, a New Yorker. He is a true New Yorker. Actually.
[00:01:36] Speaker B: I truly.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: How are you doing, Jim? Welcome to the show.
[00:01:38] Speaker B: Thank you. Thanks for having me.
[00:01:40] Speaker A: Well, you know, I went out to see you at Industry City, you know, just recently too. I've been there before, but, you know, you gave me the amazing, you know, red carpet. I absolutely love Industry City and I'm really excited for you to tell everybody all about it.
So tell us about you first.
[00:01:59] Speaker B: Me first.
[00:02:00] Speaker A: You start this tall. Yes. There's a child.
[00:02:03] Speaker B: Or even shorter.
[00:02:04] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
Technically.
[00:02:06] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: And yeah, just tell us all about you and then growing up in New York City because I think it's really interesting, your story.
[00:02:13] Speaker B: Sure. So, you know, I actually was born in Bronxville right outside of the city and moved to the city, frankly, after my parents were divorced with my, with my father and brother in 1979.
And it just had. Always loved New York City.
[00:02:36] Speaker A: Right.
[00:02:37] Speaker B: My father was in real estate in New York City with the, the Rudin family, a very well known, well respected real estate developer, you know, landlord family in New York City.
And you know, I just, before moving there, I used to love coming to the city with my father.
[00:02:58] Speaker A: In those days, I want to be sure that people know that the city means Manhattan.
[00:03:02] Speaker B: Okay. All right. Yeah. Coming to. So I used to love coming to Manhattan.
[00:03:07] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:03:08] Speaker B: To go to work with my father.
[00:03:09] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:03:10] Speaker B: Because we went to all these great restaurants, these Chinese restaurants, Peking Duck House. I remember we used to go to. I always wanted to go to Paragon. Paragon Sporty goods was like, was a highlight of Mine of wanting to go because I. All this amazing sporting goods, equipment, and I'm a big skier and snowboarder and all kinds of things. So I. So I used to love doing that and going to Central park and just all the things, and it was just so big. I remember just being so impressive, and even the train ride in and Grand Central, and I was just in awe of the buildings, you know, and the design of these buildings. It just so happens that my father's office was at 345 Park Avenue.
[00:03:55] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:03:56] Speaker B: And two of my favorite buildings in the world are right there, which is the Seagram's building and the Lever House building, which actually is my favorite building of all time. It's an understated but really, you know, amazing, timeless design.
And I just remember thinking about those things and being so interested.
And when I did move, we did move to New York City. I went to high school, a place called McBurney. We lived on the west side.
[00:04:25] Speaker A: Upper west side.
[00:04:26] Speaker B: Upper west side.
[00:04:27] Speaker A: Close to Central Park.
[00:04:28] Speaker B: Yes. Right across the street from Central park, actually.
[00:04:30] Speaker A: How cool is that? Yeah.
[00:04:31] Speaker B: View of Central Park. View of the.
Of the. Our apartment was very popular for the Thanksgiving Day parade. Like, oh, I bet we were on the fifth floor.
And all the balloons came by at eye level. And, you know, that was the party of the year, and we loved it. All our family and friends came, and so, you know, grew up in Central Park. My school. My high school was between Central park west and Columbus on 63rd Street. So my backyard and my playground for high school was Central Park.
[00:05:01] Speaker A: That's amazing. What. What a dream.
[00:05:03] Speaker B: It really was. It really was.
You know, Sheep's Meadow was, you know, regular after school when we play Ult Frisbee and riding BMX bikes and all. And a little trouble along the way.
[00:05:16] Speaker A: Right. So what years was this?
[00:05:18] Speaker B: 1979-83. I went to. I graduated high school in 1983.
[00:05:25] Speaker A: What a time. What, What, What? Paint a picture. What was it. What was it like in the 70s and 80s when. How old are you? You're a teenager. Right. And young.
[00:05:32] Speaker B: I was a te. I was.
[00:05:34] Speaker A: And you could run around. Your parents let you run around. It's a different time for all of us in general.
[00:05:37] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Sort of. You know, my father was also partially and kind of distracting, shall we say, with other interests. So I, for you, I perhaps had more leeway than I maybe should have, which made me very sort of street smart, because New York City in those days was a very different city than it is today.
Times Square was Filled with, you know, strip clubs and porn shops and things like that.
You know, Brian park was nothing like what it is today. It was. It was a drug den.
And I also was very into video games, and that was really before, you know, quality video games were at home. So I spent a lot of time in arcades in Times Square. Wow. Which, you know, had its challenges and put you in situations that perhaps I would not be thrilled to know that my kids today would be involved in.
But.
But, you know, it taught you how to be street smart. It's taught you how to watch out for things and take care of yourself.
[00:06:44] Speaker A: I don't know if I mentioned this to you when we were in. When you were showing me around Industry City, but.
But I think would be. I think your life would be a very interesting movie because it, you know, has you, first and foremost, you know, has you grown up in New York City and what people are about to learn about in a moment too, what more you do for New York City.
And. But I think it'd be really interesting, you know.
[00:07:06] Speaker B: Yeah, it's. It was a really interesting life to go from Westchester, where we had back. We had a backyard, we had a tree house. I had a little, you know, motorcycle, you know, motocross bike to living in, you know, Central Park. And my best friend in high school actually lived in the Village on Washington Place.
[00:07:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:29] Speaker B: So after school was either Central park or the West Village.
[00:07:34] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:07:34] Speaker B: And so get on the A train after school and we would hang out in Washington Square park and around nyu. We used to sneak into the Loeb Students Student center at NYU to play arcade games.
[00:07:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:47] Speaker B: Looking nowhere near college age. But back then you could kind of do what nobody really. Nobody really cares, long as you didn't cause any trouble.
And so that's kind of was my, you know, adolescent upbringing.
Going back and forth and hanging out at night and going to music venues like the Back Fence and the Bitter End. And yeah, I never went to the Blue Note because that was a little too high end. I couldn't. I couldn't.
[00:08:15] Speaker A: And that's still there too.
[00:08:16] Speaker B: It's still there.
[00:08:17] Speaker A: I just recommended it to some people the other day.
[00:08:19] Speaker B: So I went there later when I was a little bit more of an adult. But, you know, we just would hang out at my friend's house or, you know, we would just walk around and we played Wiffle ball.
There's a building, it's called the Archive building on Christopher street that actually was a government archive building. And back then it was basically abandoned. If you look at it today. It's luxury housing.
Windows were all broken. And we used to play Wiffle ball in the parking lot of St. David's School, which is right across the street. And if you hit the building, that was a. That was a grand slam. If you went over the fence, that was a home run. And if you hit the building, it was an automatic grand slam.
[00:09:04] Speaker A: You make me sad that I missed all that.
[00:09:05] Speaker B: Yeah. And there was nobody there. I mean, you would hit the building. Nobody cared. There was nobody in it. The board, the windows were all boarded up. And that was. There was a lot of that, you know, Lower east side had a lot of brownstones and tenement buildings that were basically abandoned squatters in them and things like that. It was a. It was a different time. You know, the subways, you couldn't even see the. The. The metal of the inside of the subway cars. They were so tagged up. Well, yeah, you know, and the power used to go out. I don't know. A lot of people, they don't remember, like, the power would go out on the subway. So there were times where if I, you know, during vacation, I used to have a job at this.
This Hallmark store down on one Whitehall Street I would get early in the morning, and I would take the train, the one train from 66th street down there, and I'd be one of the only ones on the train. And while you're sitting there, all of a sudden the lights would go out. Wow. Because it would lose contact with the third rail. And you would just sit there, go, please go back on. Please go back on. Because I'd be like. And I was a little kid at the time, I hadn't really run around the city. Right around the city. Please go back on. Please go back on. And if it was summertime, because the air conditioning was always broken, the windows would all be open, so it was really loud in there. You're like, clack, clack, clack, clack. Like all the stuff going on. Then the lights would go out. You'd be, please go back on. Please go back on.
And, you know, it was. You know, there are a lot of people who think about that era wistfully.
[00:10:28] Speaker A: Right.
[00:10:29] Speaker B: Which I can understand from a New York City grit standpoint. But I can tell you there were many aspects of it that I would not want to revisit, you know, but. But also made me, you know, street smart. It made you realize how to get yourself out of trouble or what to avoid and what to do. But it also was.
Gave me exposure to so Many different things and music and people. And there were street performers that we got to know and, you know, knew us. And so it was. It was just a really interesting, fun way to grow up.
[00:11:06] Speaker A: I'm really jealous I couldn't experience that. You know what. What, you know would be a really interesting conversation, too, is you and Jay's dad, because Jay's dad grew up in Brooklyn, too, you know, in the city. In New York City. And that's, you know, you both have your roots here in the city. They both have great stories. Really interesting stories.
[00:11:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:11:24] Speaker A: You know, when you're mentioning the subway with the lights going out, it took me back to.
Which a movie I just rewatched, which will come up later in the podcast, is the Warriors.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: You know, when you're. I was picturing that. My mind. So that you lived the Warriors.
[00:11:37] Speaker B: I kind of did.
[00:11:39] Speaker A: Jay, have you seen that movie? It's. Yeah. See it. It's really good.
[00:11:42] Speaker B: It's a. It's a pretty. I mean, it's. It's even exaggerated compared to what it was then. But.
[00:11:48] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:49] Speaker B: But it kind of does capture a bunch of that. And it was, you know, it was a different place, you know, And I mean, I lived. I mean, honestly, I lived on Central Park west and 66 Street.
You couldn't even. You didn't really walk west, certainly not west of Amsterdam. Didn't really want to go west of Columbus Avenue. And if you walked through Lincoln center at night and there were no activities on, you were getting approached.
Wow. That. You just were right. And so there were these things. But I will tell you, you know, you think about. I think about all these stories, and they're like, well, why are you such New Yorker? Because I just loved it. I don't know. There was something about it. There was something about the action and the danger, but not so much danger. I wasn't afraid I was going to get killed or anything. But there was this. There was this kind of like, you know, action and adventure. I mean, honestly, we used to go to Bryant park back when they had. There were hedges all the way around Bryant Park. You couldn't see into it, which was probably a mistake. And from a planning standpoint, years and years before, so the inside, it was like lots of drug dealers and crazy. And we would go not to get drugs, by the way. We would go to know just to get approached. And we were teenagers and we were fast, and we were faster than them. So we literally would play this game.
[00:13:15] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:13:15] Speaker B: Where we would walk through and play chicken to see who is going to let them get the closest to you before you ran? I mean, it was basically like, you know how. What, in the suburbs, they play chicken with cars and things like that? This was our version.
[00:13:32] Speaker A: Right, exactly. I was gonna say that.
[00:13:33] Speaker B: And we were just faster and so we could. So you did these things that. That you. You know, they're not. If you think about it, that the essence of them isn't that much different than when people do in the, you know, rural and suburbs, but, you know, you just found ways to entertain in a. In an urban environment. But there, it was still New York City, and there was still Broadway, and there were still great restaurants that I really got turned on to. Remember I had sushi for the first time when I was probably 14. It was probably 1980, when that was, like, super exotic. And I was like, oh, I like this. This is interesting. Oh, I haven't had Chinese food. We used to love hanging out in Chinatown, because where did you have that outside of. You know, and. And it's just all this action, like where we are now in Canal Street. I used to go to Canal Jeans all the time and buy all kinds of crazy clothes and McDougal street, and I got turned on to falafel for the first time. I was like, what the heck is this? Or, you know, the first time I went into John's Pizza, which was my first taste of, like, great New York pizza. And as somebody who had recently moved to the city, I did what a lot of people do. I went in and ordered a slice, and they looked at me like I had three heads, because I don't sell slices. Actually, the owner's license plate says no slices.
And I was going to visit a friend that evening to have dinner at their house, and I said, yeah, no, I was trying to find your place before I got here. I want to get a slice of pizza. And I went into this place, John's, and I ordered a slice, and they looked at me like, you did what?
Yeah. I said, they don't have slices. I said, I didn't. I wasn't used to that. But I was like, this is interesting. Like, and then I had to. It just so happened they ordered it that night for dinner. You know, they. So we had it. I was like, this is amazing. I understand why they don't do it by this place.
[00:15:22] Speaker A: Right.
[00:15:22] Speaker B: Got to come out of the oven fresh. So, you know, all of these experiences that you have that have to do with quality, but also, I think what interests me, what I love about New York City, the most. And I've traveled, you know, I've been fortunate enough to travel all over the world. You know, most major cities.
New York City is the only city that has every country in the world and their food and their culture represented perfectly.
[00:15:48] Speaker A: Said. Yeah.
[00:15:48] Speaker B: You know, and I say that to my kids if we're coming back from someplace and we're flying over the city. And I would tell them every time, look down there.
Every country in the world is there. Oh, wow. And there is no other city. If you think about it, there is no other city. You could say that there are cities. You know, London has a big Indian population, big Muslim population. So other cities have populations and concentrations from other countries. Of course, New York City is the only one that has everyone.
And part of that is from Ellis island. Right? So that's kind of where it started. My grandfather was put on a boat from Spain. He originally was born in Spain when he was 12 years old, didn't speak a word of English, came through Ellis island, actually went to Cuba first because there was family there. But then when the, you know, the revolution Castro started, he had to get out of there and come to New York and came through Ellis island and got himself a busboy job at the Waldorf Astoria.
We still have.
He stole because he didn't have his. A fork, a knife and a spoon for his apartment. And we still have it. My father has it to this day, and it's. It's engraved Waldorf Astoria, you know, and it's those kind of things. And then he went on to be a real estate developer himself. And, you know, just amazing. It's the American dream and it's all of those countries. I mean, he was Spain. My grandmother was from Italy. My other grandparents from, you know, first and second generation, he was right from Spain.
But that's where the culture comes from. That's where all the. The different. I'm big into food and walking around industry cities, it probably shows, but international food and, you know, the. The types of food that you get, you know, I've. I've spent a lot of time in Seoul, Korea, for example, years ago on some business that I was working on. And, you know, it's not a complaint, but yay, Korean food every night. That's what you did. There were a couple of Italian restaurants, a couple of this and that. But you get so used to being in New York and like, you know, my kids who are now, you know, just started college, but very much Brooklyn, New York City kids, the thought of them even eating the same cuisine Multiple nights in a row is not something that they're. Right. And you think about that, and that's, you know, just indicative of all of the different true cultures. Because you're really eating these foods that aren't just, you know, fast food knockoffs of some of that stuff, the actual stuff that you get elsewhere.
[00:18:28] Speaker A: I love that you just said that because that actually ties in to the feel of industry city.
So then how did you get from being a teenager in Times Square at the porn shops to industry cities?
[00:18:43] Speaker B: The arcades is really where I was. Porn jobs were next door. I was in the arcades.
[00:18:47] Speaker A: Two industries.
[00:18:49] Speaker B: So I went to college. I went to Syracuse University and kind of, you know, trying to figure out what I wanted to do. I was actually a psychology major, which I tell people. I probably use that degree, you know.
[00:19:04] Speaker A: Right.
[00:19:04] Speaker B: A lot because I'm half therapist in what I do.
And then got out of school and so I was gonna. I was thinking about being. I was actually thinking of being a.
A therapist and just realized I just. I liked it, but I didn't like it enough to do another six years of school of it and, you know, number of years of internship. It just. I just realized I enjoyed it, but not that. And so I decided actually to go to law school. Wow.
Because I. I had always thought about that. And my grandparents and parents used to tell me that I should go to law school because I argue all the time. So I was. I was a child who didn't just accept, you know, and so I would debate them all the time. And I'll never forget, like, being in the car with my grandparents being like, you should be a lawyer. You. You debate us and argue with us on everything. And that kind of stuck in my mind. And I always kind of liked the law. And so I went to law school. Actually. Went right around the corner. Went to New York Law School.
[00:20:07] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:20:08] Speaker B: And I always loved real estate. And I remember taking my first property class.
And then it clicked. I didn't have like a click moment up until that point. I liked psychology, but I said, man, I really like this. And New York City is real estate. And I also like design and I like buildings, and my father was doing it. And I remember growing up around a lot of real estate brokers and executives and things like that. And my grandfather built some shopping centers and Yonkers and nothing big scale, but you know, what he did, and it all just kind of like came together and I really loved that. So I did a concentration of real estate in. In law school. Got out of law school. And the worst possible time to want to be in real estate law was 1992, which was the depth of not just a recession, a real estate recession. I mean there were buildings on 6th Avenue. 11, 1177 Avenue the Americas, it's called the America's Tower was actually on, half built and on. If you can imagine this unfinished, Left open in 1992, I think it was started. It was being developed by Sumitomo Real Estate, our office. So there was no place. And so getting a job in a law firm, I would interview, I did well in law school. I would interview at firms and this is what I, they would say, true story.
We actually just closed our real estate department last week. So there really isn't. Maybe you should go into bankruptcy. You do bankruptcy law. And I said that's not really what I want to do. I kind of feel like I have a passion for this and I know I'm going to be better at that. And I found my way to a job at Cushman and Wakefield, the real estate brokerage company which happened to be right across the street from 1177. We were at 1166 having the Americas.
And I started in the legal department and realized that the practice that while I liked the practice of law, it wasn't going to be what I did for the rest of my career. And I started becoming friendly with brokers that were at Cushman and Wakefield. And they all said, you know what, you're, you know your typical, you're not a typical lawyer. You can talk and you can do this and that and come hang out with us, right? So I, I was the only lawyer in the legal department that was allowed by the brokers to hang with them.
And one thing led to another. I became friendly and one of them said to me, hey, you know, I'm looking to grow a brokerage team. Why don't you leave that and do it? I promised my father I would practice for five years because he paid for law school. So I said five and five years and a month later, yeah, I went into brokerage and really enjoyed that in my legal, you know, degree helped quite a bit. I could negotiate commercial leases right away and all that and all that was really, really interesting. I like doing it. I did a big concentration in data center.
So this is before the dot com bubble. This is like the mid, mid to late 90s. And there were all these companies that wanted to develop and it's happening again right now. These data centers, it's all now it's AI Back then, it was just the founding of the Internet. You know, Amazon was $10 a share in a bookstore on the Internet. Yahoo saying Yahoo was the Google of the time, right? There was no Google right? Now look at how all this. And so we were doing that, and then it. That crashed. A huge crash. I actually was in Korea.
I was in Seoul, and it happened just like in a movie.
We were looking at buying some buildings in Seoul to turn them into carrier. What we used to call carrier hotels or data center buildings. And I'm literally in my room with a letter of intent in my hand, ready to go to the office of the owner to sign it, to buy this building. And in Korea, letters of intent are more binding than they are here in the United States.
And I'm in my room and I have CNBC up on the. On the screen, and I literally watch the 1999 tech wreck bubble burst, like, just through the floor. Everything, all the stocks and people think, like, you know, in the movies.
Only happens this way in the movies. No. I got a call, like, literally 10 minutes later from the person I was working with that was here in New York, couldn't make that trip.
And he said, you. Have you gone to that meeting yet with the letter of intent? I said, no, again, don't.
We're not doing it.
Book yourself the next flight. We're out. Come home. Wow. It was just like that. Just like in the movies literally happened that way. Booked a flight the next day, and I was doing other things along the way. Office. I had never really done retail up until that point.
And then I had this moment that was like my real aha moment.
I was walking around Chelsea with my girlfriend at the time, now my wife.
And there was this building that was the old Nabisco Baking building. Did you say NBC? NBC on the outside of it. And had all these crazy sculptures. I remember seeing it as a kid, but you didn't really pay much attention to it. That area was truly meatpacking. It wasn't me. Pa. Right. It was actually a meatpacking place. There wasn't really much reason to go there. But I remember seeing this building was brick with these arches and all this stuff, but suddenly it had these incredible stone sculptures in front of it. I said, what is that? Let's go in there. So we walk in.
They had already done a man named Irwin Cohen, who was. It was really his. You know, he started the development of Chelsea Market.
There weren't really many stores, but the storefronts were all there, and the fountain was there. And and the arch with the, you know, the brick arch with the clock was there. And I looked at that and I said, this is incredible. You know, I love old buildings. I love history. I like. And I said to my girlfriend at the time, I said, I don't know who did this, but I have to meet this person and someday I have to work with this person.
[00:26:31] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:26:32] Speaker B: And several years later, this was even before the dot com.
I was representing a client, telecom client that wanted to buy a building called 85 10th Avenue, which is technically part of Chelsea Market, but is across 10th Avenue between 15th and 16th. And they were looking for a building to do a data center. So they wanted to buy the building. So they bought the building from Irwin Cohen and his investors. Yeah, I did not meet Irwin at the time because he did not want to sell the building. His partners did. So he refused to even meet with me. Like, I didn't take it personally. They just wouldn't. And. And I spent. I was spending time down there and I really wanted to meet him, but I guess I was associated with that sale. He didn't really want to talk to me or, you know, associate. But a couple years later, that same client, after the dot com bubble burst, came to us, me and my partner, and said, we want to sell this building. We. They just put $200 million into rebuilding the whole thing.
They wanted to keep a couple of floors where they want to sell this building. What do you guys think? And I said, we should go right back to Irwin Belvedere Capital, Angelo Gordon, who were the, you know, developers, owners, investors at the time? I said, because I know they kind of didn't want to sell it to begin with. They sold it because they wanted to really just focus on Chelsea Market. Yeah, I know they can execute. I know they would like to. And so we went back and then Irwin wanted to meet with me and we met and we just hit it off immediately. Like, I just loved what he did. Just the way if you walk through there exposing history, but not in a hokey way, in a real grit way, which kind of gets back to the grit of New York City. Like that was. He embraced that and he and I just hit it off. And then he said, hey, do you want to be the leasing agent for this building that you just sold back to us? And I said, of course I do.
And I just started spending all my time at Chelsea Market. People at the Cushman Wakefield officer be like, where's Jimmy? He got to the point, like, we know where he is. He's at Chelsea Market. He's with Irwin.
[00:28:35] Speaker A: And I think most people listening know Chelsea Market.
[00:28:38] Speaker B: Yeah, you know, it's just a great, I mean, just a great place. You know, the, the design, it's, you know, all of that and then it gets back to community also because bricks and mortar and old details are great, but if they don't. And this is what I really truly learned from Irwin, who really became my mentor. Doing what I would do later and get to Industry City.
I, we just kept working together. And one day he called me, he said, you know, you really love what I do here. You, you like, you get it. I haven't met work with somebody like you that really gets it. You should leave. Cushman, come here. Continue the development with me. Continue. Chelsea Market. We're going to, we'll redevelop 85 10th Avenue. We'll work on other buildings. And I said, yes, I have to do this, because if I don't do this. And I had a very successful, you know, brokerage practice at the time.
I had some people telling me, don't do that, you don't understand. And I said, look, I, I just have a love for this and I know I will regret never having done this.
And I could always be a broker if I wanted to. And so I did it. And he taught me, you know, how to do this. And what I mean by this is not just that. It is the design, it is the history, but it is the community. And at the time we were working with people like Manhattan Fruit Exchange, Lobster Place, Bonitalia, Amy's Bread, Sarah Beth.
Um, and they were more than tenants. I almost wish there was a better word than tenant and landlord. Right. Because it didn't feel that way. We were in it together. Our office was on the ground floor. Yeah, Irwin didn't even have an office.
He had a two foot by two foot table, marble, you know, with a pedestal and a phone on it right in the window. It's where Chelsea Market Basket is right now.
[00:30:35] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:30:36] Speaker B: Most people wouldn't do that because people then walk in if tenants complain, blah, blah, blah. When people kind of want to separate, we were the opposite. We were right there, front and center. And if you wanted to talk to us, yeah, we were there to do it.
[00:30:50] Speaker A: There's more of a connection that you like with your, with the tenant, so to speak.
[00:30:53] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:30:54] Speaker A: You know, so Jim, do you also know what is famous about Chelsea Market? The origins of Chelsea Market, what was invented there?
[00:31:02] Speaker B: I do.
[00:31:03] Speaker A: What is it?
[00:31:03] Speaker B: The Oreo cookie.
[00:31:04] Speaker A: There you go. Yeah, I figured you Would.
[00:31:06] Speaker B: We used to tell that story all the time. That it was.
[00:31:08] Speaker A: It's interesting.
[00:31:09] Speaker B: It was burnt pieces, you know, the left. Like the overcooked pieces of cookies, and that the filling was actually originally lard.
That's the story goes. Know that the story goes. And you never know. The people embellish, but the story goes. It was originally somebody took some of the remnants, put them together, and there was lard there and put lard in between. And that was. Now, obviously, it did not stay that way because that was quite as attractive.
[00:31:39] Speaker A: Right.
[00:31:39] Speaker B: As the sugar center. But, yes, I did know that.
[00:31:43] Speaker A: Well, it makes. That makes me laugh because now thinking back, because you and I are the same age, basically, and when we were kids, our parents cooked with lard.
[00:31:50] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:50] Speaker A: You know, it's funny how we. How much larder we ate, Right?
[00:31:53] Speaker B: Yes.
Turns out it's not so bad for you.
[00:31:56] Speaker A: Right? Right.
[00:31:57] Speaker B: It's actually not.
It's not hydrogenated. It's not baked. Like, it turns out, hey, they were right. It's the real stuff, you know.
[00:32:05] Speaker A: Okay. But go ahead.
[00:32:05] Speaker B: But, yeah, so we did that. We ended up doing 85 10th Avenue. I brought, you know, Del Posto, which I. I had met Mario Batali and his partner Joe Bastianich. We did that. We did Craft. We did something with Tom Colicchio. Craft Steak. We did Morimoto Budokan, which is still there.
[00:32:24] Speaker A: Right.
[00:32:25] Speaker B: And then the buildings were eventually sold. And so, you know, I worked on a bunch of other things. In the meantime, we, Angela Gordon bought Crunch Fitness and asked me to work on that. Before that, I said to my wife, we got nothing. I want to just travel through Southeast Asia for a couple months. We did that. In the middle of that, towards the end of that trip, I got a call. I was on, literally on the Mekong Delta at a floating market. And I love markets. And that's why you all are just. I. You know, and, hey, we're buying Crunch. You want to work on this? I don't know anything about the health club industry. Yeah, you don't need to. It's the design. It's a similar design. It's real estate. It's construction. So I came back, I did that for a period of time, and then Industry City came along, and they said, hey, we, you know, can you come and work on this with us? And I looked at. And I just happened to live in Carroll Gardens.
[00:33:18] Speaker A: Right.
[00:33:19] Speaker B: Total coincidence. 10 minutes away. I knew the buildings. I knew them growing up. Yeah. And. Exactly. And I said, let's look at this. And I went to visit. And I said, oh my God. I mean, Chelsea Market was a million one square feet.
[00:33:33] Speaker A: That's incredible. What year is this you're talking.
[00:33:35] Speaker B: This would have been 2015.
Okay, 2015, 24. They actually started working on the deal 2013. I was still doing my thing with Crunch because the idea was fix it up and then it was sold.
So those investors said, hey, can you wait a little bit?
That's fine. And so really the construction on that really started in like 2015.
But you know, that's. It's 6 million square feet, 16 buildings, 35 acres.
[00:34:03] Speaker A: Massive. Incredible too.
[00:34:04] Speaker B: I thought when I was working on Chelsea, that was massive. That was a million one with 85 10th, maybe a million seven.
All of a sudden six million. I was like, wow, whoa, this. And we own the streets.
[00:34:16] Speaker A: How many buildings? 16, 16 building.
[00:34:18] Speaker B: It's 130 elevators, 40 lobbies.
You know, it's. It's basically two and a half Empire State buildings put together, but sort of on their side.
So we started looking at that and we said, okay, you know, we could do something with this. Those buildings actually were. I. I describe them as shipping containers before the advent and shipping containers. So before shipping containers, things, goods would come off of boats going to be pulled out and you know, in nets you see in the old films, go on to train cars. Train cars would poodle into what are our courtyards and hand hoist it up into the buildings and then back out to a trainer truck off to the end user. As soon as you had shipping containers, you didn't need that those buildings anymore. The step was unnecessary. So everything moved to New Jersey because you needed a lot of land. Those buildings sat underutilized for many, many years. You know, 15 occupancy, maybe 1500 people working there every day. And we said, look, we could do something like this. That's like Chelsea on a much bigger scale. It was going to be harder because Chelsea at least was in the middle of Chelsea.
[00:35:23] Speaker A: Correct.
[00:35:24] Speaker B: Although not the Chelsea of what it is today, but it still had that, you know, and dense residential around it. But we felt like we could do something because of its size.
There was no office, you know, use in the area.
So we did basically what we did with Chelsea Market. And this is really the secret behind the whole thing because you need retail, you need things, services and things like that in order to get people to lease the upper floors.
[00:35:48] Speaker A: Right.
[00:35:49] Speaker B: And that's where the majority of the space is. And so. But who's going to do retail when you've got no foot Traffic and you got nobody upstairs.
[00:35:56] Speaker A: Yeah. And so. And also, this is in Brooklyn.
[00:35:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:35:58] Speaker A: This isn't in Manhattan. This is in Brooklyn off the. But it's a real quick. I want to say it's super easy to get there. You just take the D train from Times Square slash Bryant park, straight shot to Brooklyn.
[00:36:10] Speaker B: It's straight shot like the DN&R&.
[00:36:13] Speaker A: Yeah, it's beautiful on the Manhattan Bridge as you're going there and coming back.
[00:36:16] Speaker B: Yep. Yeah. No, absolutely. It's actually very close.
[00:36:19] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:36:20] Speaker B: But it didn't have the dense residential around it, so that was a challenge.
[00:36:24] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:36:25] Speaker B: Having the subway stop there was key. We. I don't.
[00:36:27] Speaker A: One block. We wouldn't have even.
[00:36:28] Speaker B: We wouldn't have done this if. If that wasn't there. It was very important that we had that.
But, you know, so how do you get retail if you got no foot traffic and then you can't get people upstairs? So what we did was, which was this is something that Irwin, you know, had come up with a long time ago. And by the way, the subsequent owners, Jamestown Properties, continued that vision, I think, very well, understanding the DNA of it. And some people wouldn't have. And maybe it would be different. I feel it's very. It still has like what it had back then.
You go to wholesalers and commissaries, bakeries and things like that who are looking for production space.
[00:37:09] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:37:09] Speaker B: And you say, okay, we're going to lease you the production space. We'll make you a good deal, but you have to do some retail with us. And they all hate that idea. They all go, what, are you crazy? I'm not going to do retail here. There's nobody here. Well, that. You're not going to get the space and you want commissary space. And here's, you know, the bad news is there's no foot traffic right now. The good news is there's none because you don't have to double up your employment, you know, for retail.
[00:37:32] Speaker A: Right.
[00:37:32] Speaker B: The person at Lilac Chocolates making the chocolate. When somebody walks in, turns around and sells them a chocolate and just start us that way. That allows us to lease the upper floors. And that's what got that going. Once that gets going, those people that are in the upper floors, in the offices are now coming down and buying from those folks who normally, like in the case of Colson Patisserie, you know, sell makes croissants there for wholesale and things like that. So let's say they're making those and you get a quarter on the wholesale market, suddenly you're getting $3 retail.
And that's. That's how it starts, you know, and they're like, oh, I like this. You know, and they come back to you, oh, how do we get more people here? How do we do more of this? We like this. And the ball starts rolling.
And that. What gets you to the point where you continue to lease the upper floors and you get. So when we took over, there were 1500 employees working there. Now there's 9000.
[00:38:26] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:38:27] Speaker B: And so that's a lot of people to buy from the retailers, which keeps them healthy. And they have to be kept healthy because without them, nobody's leasing the upper floors. Nobody's coming there with their employees if their employees can't get lunch or a drink or have some entertainment. We did a lot of that, too. We do a lot of music, performing arts, visual arts, things like that in the beginning, which we underwrote. And then eventually it sustains itself.
[00:38:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:38:53] Speaker B: You know, and that's the idea. You're. You're. What you're doing is you're putting down kindling and you're getting the fire, you know, started. And eventually if you do it right, it turns into its own fire, which is where we have gotten to with this.
[00:39:06] Speaker A: Right. It's amazing, you know. You know, going back to what you said earlier, too, with the tenants, you know, you introduced me to some of the tenants there. You know, when everybody is.
It's. It's a different feeling. Like you said, it's. It's just more comfortable. You know, you walked in there, they're all like, hey, Jim, what's up? You know what Ayaka is that from?
[00:39:28] Speaker B: From Tadima.
[00:39:28] Speaker A: Yeah, her cough. Her bakery.
[00:39:30] Speaker B: Japanese bakery.
She's amazing.
[00:39:33] Speaker A: You know, I, you know, she's Sweet and. And Mr. Craves, Mr.
[00:39:38] Speaker B: Caves and his. The Brooklyn Pop experience.
[00:39:41] Speaker A: I can't wait to go to his. His. His play. His New York. His New York Brooklyn play. Yeah, you need to go too, because it's. It's about his life. And it's. It's so intense and amazing and tragic, sadly. And it's just. But I really want to see.
[00:39:56] Speaker B: It's real.
[00:39:57] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:39:57] Speaker B: You know, and it's so interesting, it's immersive, and it's really goes back to that time of New York that we started talking about. Right. That's. It all comes.
The warriors are. Saturday Night Fever are represented in their Saturday Night Fever. And that's also about curating the people, and that's what creates the community. And I spend a lot of time with potential tenants, especially on the ground floor, making sure that it's the right thing. People are going to want to come see this, but they're, they're also the right citizens, you know, they're, they're community minded. They want to work together with their fellow tenants. And that creates an actual community, an actual sense of community. Not just a talking point. It actually happens.
[00:40:42] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:40:43] Speaker B: And that makes a connection with the people that are upstairs. Connected with people that visit. We now do about 15, 000 people a day on the weekends that come and visit us and come to eat and drink and see shows and shop.
[00:40:58] Speaker A: So much for everybody. I mean, kids too. Yeah, so much for kids. And I, I read that, you know, parents love it there too because there's so much space for kids to, you know, and, and you can see them, right? You can see the kids and there's a lot of space for them to have fun.
[00:41:14] Speaker B: And it's all industrial space. They can't break anything, you know, like they can't break anything.
[00:41:18] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:41:18] Speaker B: And we're not on the, you know, it's not on the street, so you don't have to worry about that. Our courtyards are magic. Our courtyards are basically parks Y and people love to hang out and they'll spend the day there. They come in the morning very easy. They go to Haik or climbing gym. Then they'll go get lunch. They'll go to Japan Village which really is the, the thing that really, you know, blew it up really. That was the, the concept that, that really.
And continues to grow. It started as a 2500 square foot Japanese grocery store really. Because I wanted a Japanese grocery store in Brooklyn, honestly. And I, I used to travel Japan a lot.
[00:41:56] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:41:57] Speaker B: And I thought there isn't one in Brooklyn. When you know, there isn't something that you think will be popular. It's, you know, there's not a lot of competition. And so we started it that way and then it just kept growing and the owner, operator and I just kept egging each other on. How about, about. How about little stalls, back alleys in Tokyo? How about a restaurant? How about a liquor store? How about now karaoke? We just open about.
[00:42:22] Speaker A: Amazing.
[00:42:22] Speaker B: All of this stuff. We have a cultural center, you know, cultural part. And we actually just recreated. I'm obsessed with Japan and I'm obsessed with the. All the crazy alleyways that Yoko chose in Tokyo and Kyoto and elsewhere. And we just built one of those.
[00:42:36] Speaker A: Yeah, you showed me that.
[00:42:38] Speaker B: That's right. We did A little thing in there.
[00:42:41] Speaker A: Incredible.
[00:42:41] Speaker B: Which is now going to be sort of the main entrance to Japan Village. But it's also done in a way that's. We're very careful. There's no criticism of Disney. I think they do a great job. But we, we try to make it feel like you're actually there. Which means we don't mind some warts on it. We don't mind.
[00:42:59] Speaker A: Oh, nice.
[00:43:00] Speaker B: Some rough edges because that's real. That's life. Right? And so we, we're very careful. And where that line lies is always up for debate. But we try to make sure that we, we do things like that. And we also do what we consider curative or interesting retail. Like we don't have a bank.
We don't have a pharmacy. We don't have that. Because everybody has that in their neighborhood.
[00:43:25] Speaker A: Right.
[00:43:25] Speaker B: So why are you coming to us, you know, if you just have that in your neighborhood? We do things like Japan Village. Sahadi has one other location in downtown Brooklyn. But not, you know, that's the only other one you, you come to us for those things for. You know, we have a blacksmith where you can learn to be a blacksmith.
[00:43:45] Speaker A: Right.
[00:43:45] Speaker B: I mean, who acts as a black.
[00:43:46] Speaker A: You have a. What's the person who makes shoes?
[00:43:48] Speaker B: We. Francis Wapplinger, who's our, our shoemaker. And he's an actual scratch from scratch.
[00:43:54] Speaker A: It's incredible.
[00:43:54] Speaker B: Not even bolts from bolts of leather, you know. And he apprenticed in. In Florence and we found him in Gowanus. He had this little studio and he sits right in the window and makes his shoes. And it's not.
[00:44:06] Speaker A: That's really cool.
[00:44:07] Speaker B: And it's not just for show, you know, it's. It is. It is a show. Yeah, but it's actually the business.
[00:44:15] Speaker A: Yes, right. That's his passion. And he's showing you right there what he's doing.
[00:44:18] Speaker B: It's not just a weekend, like carnival thing. Just go and see stuff being made just because they. These are actual businesses and jewelry makers and the bakeries and all that kind of stuff. And we have our distilleries. Brooklyn, Cora, I was going to say, which is our sake brewery, which we're very proud of. They started at like 2,000 square feet. Two American guys met at a wedding in Tokyo. Had never met each other before. Like, hey, nobody really makes. We love sake. Nobody makes really good people do make sake, but at the time, nobody makes good sake.
One guy, it was a biochemist and in a craft brewer in Portland. The other guy was in finance.
Brandon and Brian. And they quit their jobs and said, let's do this. They came to us. I saw that hockey brewery. Yes, yes and yes. You know, when can we start? And we started them at 2,000 square feet. They ended up getting a huge investment from 100-year-old Japanese hockey company called Hawkeye San, who found them because the executive Hakaisan went to come visit Japan Village, heard about this sake brewery, went over, met them, developed a relationship, invested to grow. And we grew them from 2,500 square feet to 25,000 square feet. And I think what's really interesting about that, and I talk about this a lot, we talk about New York City not being able to maintain its manufacturing base, which I think is important.
[00:45:47] Speaker A: Mm.
[00:45:48] Speaker B: And our working waterfront. What normally happens is, and you've seen it with countless breweries and when they get to a certain size, they leave the city. And it isn't even really about the rent. Even at no rent. It's. It's just more expensive to do business in New York City. Labor is more expensive because the cost of living is more expensive. The fact what they and others we've renewed lilac chocolates and calls a patisserie and we're growing Fort Hamilton, another distillery and standard wormwood and a place called Bittermunk.
The income they're making from the retail portion, so the tasting rooms, you know, the, the with the bakery and Colson and things like that, the income they're able to make offsets that higher cost of living, that higher cost of labor, that higher cost of doing business in New York City.
That's what keeps them in New York City. We've actually been able to buck the trend, which has been a trend that really nobody's actually, I think, until us been able to figure out how to do it. And it's really because of all the people that we were. It all kind of comes together and that's how you keep higher paying jobs, manufacturing jobs in New York City.
And for the business, it's also better because Brooklyn Core would never have been connected with Hawkeye San if they had moved out of the city. And we're doing something like in New Jersey. Right. And so there's that awareness piece, there's that marketing piece, there's all that, that then helps with their sales. And somebody just goes to Brooklyn Core. Now they're at a restaurant, they see Brooklyn Core on the man. Oh, I want that. You know, and it, it's this whole, you know, holistic ecosystem that works all together. And I really think that's the Model and, and residential. And this is the big, you know, sort of soapbox that I think I'm not the only one. We are affordable housing, housing in New York City.
So important. And it's important that it also be near these manufacturing places. Because the biggest challenge that our manufacturers face is access to labor, consistent labor. Because what happens is they end up moving further away from where the manufacturing has happened, which does a couple of things, makes their commute much longer and much more expensive. And they will all tell you that they hire people and that often after a month of doing that, these people quit. And so then they got to go all over again and figure this out. So I think there is this model that we have been working on and, and really fine tuning and figuring out how to have this multi use community.
That's a walking community. Right. So people can now walk to their jobs. Yeah, they stay at their jobs. Right. Their commute is less expensive, they put more money in their pocket. Then these businesses grow, then you get more manufacturing, then office comes with it and then the entertainment comes and the food and beverage is part of it. And it's this whole walking community. And like I live in Carroll Gardens, which is a great walking community. It's a perfect example. I love it because on Saturdays, myself, my wife, our dog, we got the farmer's market. We go to the shops, we know all the shopkeepers. I work in the area.
It is the sustainable way to keep all types of businesses in New York City. And then what does that do? At the end of the day, it maintains and increases the tax base. Walking communities, by the way, create more of a percentage of other than Wall Street. Wall Street's an obvious economic engine. Right. The financial industry. But having a walking multi use community is actually one of the biggest contributors to the tax base and quality of life and staying in New York City. And so I'm a huge New York City fan. I've loved it from the beginning. When my wife and I first started getting serious, I said, I just want to be clear about two things.
I'm never leaving New York City and I ski. So we have to, we have to be good with both of those things. You don't have to ski as much as I want to, that's fine, but I got to do that. But more importantly, I love this city. It's done so much for me. I think it's so dynamic. I think it's a great model for the world about how all these cultures can live together. If you think about it, any of the challenges that we have either from crime or anything like that. They don't have to do with different culture. They don't have to do with culture. Culture clash. They have to do with different class of socioeconomic and things like that. Right. But you notice we don't really have that culture on culture clash here because it's an international city and we live together in it. I think that's just special and needs to be recognized.
[00:50:49] Speaker A: Completely agree.
[00:50:51] Speaker B: I don't, I don't like to be too salesy about. I see. You know, because I think it's a real thing. I don't have to be sales.
[00:51:00] Speaker A: Right.
[00:51:00] Speaker B: You know, some people when I do these things are like, did you prepare for that? Did you? I said, I. I've been preparing my whole life. You know, my experience has prepared me, you know. Yes. You know, you think about things before you go in, but if this is what you do every day and it's your passion, you're prepared and it's real, you know.
[00:51:19] Speaker A: Completely agree.
So, Jim, before we let you go, we here at the New Yorkers podcast want to know what it means to you, Jim Somoza, to be a New Yorker.
[00:51:31] Speaker B: To me, it just means being a citizen of the world. You know, I think being a New Yorker means appreciating all of the cultures and food and entertainment and, and all of that that New York City is. And it's the appreciation of that. Some people don't care about that. I don't understand not caring about that. But to me, that's what being a New York, New Yorker is all about is. Is talking to the person from where, you know, Pakistan that you just met about there or challenges and how they got here and what they like. You know, it's. There is no. To me, it's about not being. Having any barriers culturally with everybody because this is the most multinational city in the world.
[00:52:24] Speaker A: Love it. Completely love it. Completely felt that. Completely agree.
[00:52:28] Speaker B: And makes it fun. I'll give you like one interesting story if you want to include it. Several years ago, it was New Year's Eve and we were having a people over, but it was going to be later. Our kids were younger and the friend, the, the. The kids of some of our friends were over at our house and we were. It was still early. We wanted to get some dinner. So we live in Carol Gardens. We went into Sunset park in one of the big Chinese, you know, sort of banquet halls. And while we're there, there's a wedding going on.
Chinese, two Chinese people. Everybody at the wedding was Chinese. So they were in the main banquet hall and then there was a room next to it where other. Where people were just having dinner and my kids and their friends were looking at this and I said, can you imagine any other place?
And I'm sure that does exist somewhere, but that you're sitting here having dinner on New Year's Eve in the middle of a Chinese wedding.
That ain't happening.
[00:53:32] Speaker A: Right.
[00:53:33] Speaker B: In. I'm not going to name city names because then people get pissed at me, but that ain't happening in a lot of places. Right.
But let's face it, we all know that's not happening in a lot of places.
[00:53:43] Speaker A: Right.
[00:53:44] Speaker B: And you could see it in our kids eyes how that was going in and the appreciation of that, you know, and that's almost like travel, but here.
[00:53:54] Speaker A: Correct.
[00:53:55] Speaker B: You know, I like that.
[00:53:56] Speaker A: That's really nice. So thanks everybody for joining us today for this week's episode of the New Yorkers podcast. And Jim, why don't you let everyone know where they can find you on your social media.
[00:54:07] Speaker B: Sure. I'm big on Instagram. I'm also a fellow photographer, as you are. That's my other passion in life. Someday when I grow up, that's what I want to do, but I do it anyway. And so Instagram is my, you know, outlet on that. It's got a lot to do. Of course there's Industry City on there, but it's travel and it's food. So it's Jim underscore Samoza. Very simple. S O M O Z A.
That's my handle.
[00:54:34] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:54:35] Speaker B: And that's it. Or for, you know, Industry City. Obviously it's at Industry City.
[00:54:42] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:54:43] Speaker B: Is our, is our handle there. You find everything about our scheduled calendars and all the things that are going on and all the fun stuff.
[00:54:50] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Follow both everybody.
[00:54:52] Speaker B: Yes. Go to mine. I want some more followers.
Help me out. Every time I do something like this, I get more. But I'm only kidding. It's. It just, it's more fun than anything.
[00:55:00] Speaker A: Yeah. You know, I'm sure Jim can, you know, if he has time to answer your questions too, because Industry City is really just such a spectacular place. I love going there. Like, I mean, I just had such a great time there.
[00:55:12] Speaker B: Good.
[00:55:13] Speaker A: And it's just a great.
[00:55:14] Speaker B: We appreciate it. I can, I can see it. And yeah, I answer questions all the time. I actually find myself walking across campus. If I see somebody's lost, you know, hey, where. What can I tell you? Where would you like to go? So, always happy to do that.
[00:55:28] Speaker A: Perfect.
Once again everybody, I'm your host Kelly Kopp, also known as New York City Cop all across my social media.
[00:55:37] Speaker B: So thank you for having me. But I want to make sure that everybody knows the like and subscribe the New Yorkers Podcast and you follow New Yorkers on social media and New Yorkers Podcast and your fantastic Instagram which is New York City Cop K o P P. Yep, the great feed. I'm not just saying that because I know you and I like you. I really enjoy watching Jim.
[00:56:07] Speaker A: I appreciate you buddy. That's awesome.
You can leave a rating or a comment to let us know how you are enjoying the show. My friends, we read through all your comments and DMs so please we would love to hear from you. Thank you Rissa Times three and Michelle Channel X and Dawn Sievers for your kind words on the last episode. If you want to be featured at the end of an episode, leave a rating on Apple Podcast or a comment on Spotify.
[00:56:35] Speaker B: And I'd like to thank Julia F Merrill M e R r I l l Peer Underscore Nam n a m underscore Sook S UK and Auntie Ho A U n E I E A x o for your comments on Instagram.
[00:56:56] Speaker A: That's great.
Have a lovely day everyone. One and we will see you next time.
[00:57:02] Speaker B: Goodbye all.
[00:57:03] Speaker A: Bye everybody.
[00:57:06] Speaker B: This is the last stop on this train. Everyone please leave the train.
[00:57:11] Speaker A: Thank you for riding with MTA New York City Transit.
