Dupont Indian Grocery Kickstarter Succeeds

A Kickstarter campaign to raise $20,000 for Pansaari, a planned organic Indian grocery store in the Dupont Circle area, has succeeded. Rano Singh, Pansaari's aspiring owner/operator, informed Kickstarter supporters in a January 21 email the effort to raise funds for unanticipated renovation and development costs for the store space had reached its goal. Pansaari will be located in the basement of 1603 17th Street, at the corner of Q Street.

1603 17th Street is on the right

"Tonight I will sleep knowing I can pay for my construction materials, and go to meet my landlords tomorrow reinforced by the support of my community. Thank you all," Singh wrote in an email through Kickstarter.

Contributors have already had their credit cards charged.

"I spent yesterday firming up order for the construction materials. Now that I have the funds I don't want to delay. I want Pansaari to be open as soon as possible," Singh wrote in a separate email.

In the latter email, Singh indicated Pansaari could be open in May. She also invited Kickstarter contributors to a pre-opening ceremony.

Pansaari's Kickstarter campaign was the subject of a January 2 SALM blog post.

Singh announced her intention to open Pansaari at the November 13, 2013, meeting of Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 2B/Dupont Circle.

Kickstarter Campaign for Dupont Indian Grocery

Pansaari, an organic Indian grocery store try to set up near Dupont Circle, has started a Kickstarter campaign.

"My trouble is cost overruns with construction," says Pansaari's aspiring owner/operator Rano Singh on her Kickstarter appeal.

Pansaari seeks to open at 17th and Q Streets

Pansaari seeks $20,000 in pledges before the Kickstarter campaign ends on January 22. As of January 1, it has $2,235 in pledges.

Premiums on offer for low-level contributors include Pansaari mugs, aprons, and tote bags, plus free servings of chai and a chance to visit the store prior to its official opening. At higher levels, enticements include sit down dinners for six or eight, or recipes and tables at the establishment named in the contributor's honor.

On her Kickstarter appeal, Singh says: "The location is perfect, but the space is not. The space has been vacant for 4 years, and the costs of providing basic heating, ventilation, cooling, plumbing, and electric upgrades are far greater than my original estimate from a contractor. I am hopeful my landlord will reconsider, and help with making this a useable space."

If funding comes together, Pansaari will open in April in the basement of 1603 17th Street NW, in a mixed-use building at the corner of Q Street. The last tenant was the Club Chaos nightclub, which closed in 2008.

Rano Singh announced her intention to open Pansaari at a meeting of Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 2B/Dupont on November 13, 2013. See the SALM blog post of November 15, 2013, for more information.

17th and Q to Get Organic Indian Grocery Store

Updated November 15, 4pm - see below

An organic Indian grocery store named Pansaari will open at 17th and Q Streets NW, the future owner/operator announced at the regularly monthly meeting of Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 2B/Dupont Circle on November 13.

1603 17th Street is on the right

The store will be located in the basement of 1603 17th Street NW, the former location of Club Chaos nightclub, which closed in 2008.

Owner/operator Rano Singh spoke briefly to the ANC about her vision for the new establishment. She described it as a "Indian organic grocery and cooking school". As for her reason for opening in downtown D.C., she said: "I'm tired of running to Rockville and McLean" in search of genuine Indian ingredients.

She also said there would be a chai bar, but no take-out, so members of the neighborhood would be forced to stop and get to know each other.

Pansaari has a web page where you can sign up for email updates about the grocery's opening.

Although the word Pansaari (also spelled "Pansari") is translated by online Hindu-English dictionaries as "Grocer", a 15-minute promotional video for the new store (available here) has another explanation. A "Pansaari", the video says, is a traditional herb and spice merchant, whose store is also a sort of holistic pharmacy for practitioners of Ayurvedic medicine.

The video also details Singh's influences and inspiration for the new venture.

Some digitally-created visions of the future store's interior appearance are available here.

Update

Thanks to an email from ANC2B Commissioner Kishan Putta (district 04) for this additional information:

• Pansaari has signed a lease on the space.
• Architectural drawings are being finalized before submission to D.C. authorities.
• Projected timetable: Construction starts in December, storing opening March.
• Pansaari may seek a wine/beer license.

Putta adds: "In the Internet age, a liquor license moratorium does not save or promote retail business in the District. Innovative and unique business ideas are the keys to success. I welcome Ms. Singh to the neighborhood and wish her the best of luck."

ANC2B Supports New Liquor Licensee in 17th Street Moratorium Area

Duke's Grocery, a new coffee shop/market/pub/café to open at 1513 17th Street NW, got a pair of important approvals from Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 2B/Dupont at its regular monthly meeting on August 14.

Duke's Grocery is located within the boundaries of the Dupont East (a.k.a. “17th Street”) Liquor License Moratorium district. The extension of the moratorium was the subject of a long separate debate at the same meeting.

1513 17th Street NW, future site of Duke's Grocery

First, ANC2B approved a stipulated license for the establishment by a vote of 8-0. A stipulated license is a temporary license for a liquor-serving establishment, good for as long as it takes for the DC government to reach a final decision.

The granting of a stipulated license is one of the few decisions an ANC can take which is binding, not advisory, in nature. It does not need approval from another government body.

Second, ANC2B voted to support the application for a permanent liquor license before DC's Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) Board. This marked a departure from frequent ANC practice of automatically protesting all new liquor license applications to maintain leverage with prospective entrepreneurs.

Abigail Nichols, Commissioner for district 05, made a motion to protest the application. She then seemed surprised when other Commissioners asked her to explain why the ANC should protest. Nichols said she had documents to support her case for a protest, but she had not brought them with her to prepare. She asked for an hour postponement to prepare, but no motion was made so the debate continued. Nichols said she was concerned that Duke's would have a sidewalk café. The aspiring proprietors and other commissioners pointed out a sidewalk café would require a separate license, and the ANC could discuss this problem when Duke's came back for ANC endorsement of a sidewalk café license. Then Nichols said she was concerned about the possibility the license might some day change hands. ANC2B Chair Will Stephens (district 08) said protesting a licensee for this reason was not looked on favorably by the DC authorities.

Several members of the community told the ANC they supported Duke's Grocery.

The motion to protest was voted down 1-7. Nichols was the only vote for, and Stephens abstained.

Then Nichols put forward a motion to endorse the liquor license application for Duke's Grocery. ANC2B voted in favor without dissent. Three Commissioners did not vote: Stephanie Maltz (district 03), Kishan Putta (04), and Mike Silverstein (06). Maltz and Putta had stepped outside at the moment of the vote. Silverstein does not participate in debates or votes about liquor licenses due to possible conflicts of interest.

Daniel Kramer and Alex McCoy are the future co-proprietors of Duke's Grocery and presented before the ANC prior to the discussion.

Further reporting on other activity at this meeting will follow.

ANC2B Endorses Reduced 17th Street Liquor License Moratorium in 4-4 Tie Vote

An obscure quirk in local regulations may prolong the life the 17th Street liquor license moratorium.

The vote by Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 2B/Dupont was a 4-4 tie on a resolution to recommend the continuation of a reduced version of the current moratorium. Under normal parliamentary procedure, such a tie would mean that a motion (in this case, a motion to continue a reduced version of the moratorium) would fail. However, the ANC2B city-wide bylaws for ANCs state that, in the case of a tie, the chair of commission will have, in effect, an extra vote to break a tie. In this case, ANC 2B chair Will Stephens (district 08) cast the deciding vote.

The vote on the resolution recommending continuation of the moratorium was:

For: Stephens, Abigail Nichols (05), Kishan Putta (04), and Kevin O'Connor (02).

Against: Leo Dwyer (07), Mike Feldstein (01), Stephanie Maltz (03), and Noah Smith (09).

Not voting was Commissioner Mike Silverstein (06). Silverstein works for is a member of the ABC Board and recuses himself from all votes on liquor licensing matters. In this case, Silverstein was attending an ABC Board meeting and was not at the ANC meeting.

The resolution now goes to DC's Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) Board, which will make the final decision on the moratorium.

The resolution as passed has two significant points that mark the continued slow decline of the power and use of liquor license moratoriums. First, the resolution recommends that the liquor license moratorium be lifted completely for restaurants, legally defined as establishments that make more than half their revenues from food. Second, the moratorium will run for three years, instead of the possible maximum of five. See a draft of the resolution (.pdf) here.

Debate over the moratorium was long and took up most of the meeting. Before the debate on the resolution described above, Abigail Nichols put up a rival resolution requesting a 90-day emergency extension of the moratorium while the ANC looked into the matter further. The motion went down to defeat by a vote of 7-1, with Nichols as the only vote in favor. Similarly, a separate motion by Nichols to make the moratorium that passed five years, instead of three, died when there was no second.

The ANC meeting was held last night (August 14) at the Brookings Institution, 1775 Massachusetts Avenue NW.

Some background on this story is available here.

Further reporting on activity from this meeting will follow.