Glen's Garden Market Moves towards Beer Garden

Glen's Garden Market (2001 S Street NW) is taking steps to use the space outside its front door as a beer garden. Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 2B/Dupont Circle endorsed a request to change the use of the space. Right now, customers are purchasing food and coffee inside Glen's Garden Market and consuming it on benches on the patio.

Tables and umbrellas will replace benches

Danielle Vogel, owner/operator of Glen's Garden Market, told ANC 2B of plans to expand the scope of the outside space by adding a series of tables with umbrella and hiring extra servers. There will 16 places and will operate between 10am and 10pm, seven days a week.

The application will go next to the District Department of Transportation (DDOT), which handles applications of use of public spaces like sidewalks.

A successful application to DDOT will not necessarily mean that Glen's Garden Market can immediately begin to serve alcohol outside. If it has not already done so, Glen's will have to apply to D.C.'s alcohol-licensing authorities for a change to the terms of its liquor license.

Good feelings all around

Glen's Garden Market seemed to have an especially cordial relationship with the ANC. It has found an unusual way to create good feeling: it named one of the sandwiches on its menu after their district's ANC Commissioner, Mike Feldstein (district 01).

During the discussion of the public space application, Commissioner Mike Silverstein (district 06) invoked the theory of social capital.

"I can't think of a better example of that than Glen's Garden Market," Silverstein said. "I think it's an invaluable asset to the community."

Silverstein later asked Danielle Vogel, a first-time entrepreneur and former lawyer, what she had learned since the opening of Glen's, which opened with the idea it would carry exclusively locally-sourced products.

"Folks care about convenience and price point," she answered. "We tried to be responsive."

As a result, she said, Glen's has had to stock inventory that is "not indigenous".

All the Commissioners present voted to support the public space request of Glen's Garden Market.

The vote was taken at ANC2B's regular monthly meeting on April 9.

See a .pdf copy of the letter in support of Glen's that ANC2B sent to DDOT Public Space Committee here.