When Highland Coffees owner Clark Cadzow announced in September 2014 that he was unable to come to terms on a new lease with landlord Hank Saurage and would be forced to close at the end of the year, loyal patrons went ballistic.
In the days that followed, as Business Report details in a feature in its new issue, those loyal patrons took to social media to defend the neighborhood institution, excoriating Saurage and threatening to boycott any future establishment that would take over Highland Coffees’ space on West Chimes Street.
In the end, the two sides returned to the negotiating table and agreed on a new long-term lease.
More recently, the owner of Bocage Village Shopping Center experienced a similar situation. In the wake of a late February fire that began in the storeroom of Dearman’s restaurant, shopping center manager Mitch Richardson notified owner David Van Gelder his lease would not be renewed. Dearman’s devotees were irate, going so far as to begin an online petition to keep the popular diner open. In June, the parties announced they had reached an agreement on a new five-year lease.
While both landlords appeared to cave to public pressure, Saurage and Richardson say that’s not actually the case. Negotiations in both situations were more complicated than they seemed to outsiders, they say, and both leases were resolved only because several things fell into place.
Still, both high-profile incidents illustrate what can happen in an otherwise typical dispute between landlord and tenant when that tenant happens to be a beloved fixture in the community. Emotions can cloud decisions, while misperceptions muddy the waters and social media gives everyone an opportunity to weigh in.
“It can be a double-edged sword to have a tenant that is an iconic establishment everybody loves,” Saurage says. “As a landlord, do you keep the neighborhood happy? Or, when the situation warrants it, do you fight the fight?”
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