Is a food hall in Fenway worth saving?
Of course it is.
I’m not making this appeal to Time Out Market, the company that currently runs the Fenway food hall and informed vendors on Monday that it has decided to shut the place down on Jan. 23.
Nor to Phantom Gourmet, which on Thursday published a satirical post on Facebook that has been reshared a gazillion times saying it would take over the 27,000-square-foot space and fill it with a Wahlburgers, Kowloon, and Abe & Louie’s Cheesesteaks.
Ha ha, funny not funny.
I’m making this appeal to all of you: Anyone who loves to eat, anyone who believes Boston could use more fun places to hang out, anyone who wants to give chefs a place to experiment.
C’mon, we’re a region on the cutting edge of curing cancer. Our scientists developed COVID vaccines in months. Keeping the lights on a food hall? This we should be able to do … in our sleep.
I know food halls can succeed in Boston because they already do, from High Street Place in the Financial District to Hub Hall by TD Garden. Reading my colleague Janelle Nanos’s coverage, it’s clear to me the problem is not Boston, it’s Time Out.
The London-based publisher of city nightlife guides got into the food hall business when it opened a marketplace in Lisbon, Portugal in 2014 that became the country’s biggest tourist attraction. Time Out began expanding to other cities, including Boston in 2019, but has been closing its food halls in the US, with only New York set to remain past this month.
Time Out, according to the Globe, offered to let its landlord, life science real estate giant Alexandria Real Estate Equities, take over the Fenway marketplace and keep its 15 vendors in business. Alexandria decided to close the hall instead.
I can understand why Alexandria balked at the idea.
A food hall may be a feast for our stomachs but operating one successfully is a massive undertaking, said Whitney Gallivan, partner and senior managing director at Boston Realty Advisors who works with the landlord of High Street Place.
It’s like coordinating 10 to 20 restaurants under one roof, while managing a steady turnover of tenants to keep the food hall concept fresh.
“You need to constantly rework the recipe,” said Gallivan. “It’s a complete labor of love ... you can’t underestimate how much work goes into it.“
But that’s where I’m hoping Mayor Michelle Wu and any number of civic-minded business leaders enter the picture. I’m looking at you Steve Samuels, whose firm Samuels & Associates developed the 401 Park/Landmark Center complex and brought in Time Out Market before selling the building to Alexandria for $1.52 billion in 2021.
Samuels is best known for turning Fenway into one of the city’s most vibrant neighborhoods filling it with restaurants, apartments, offices, and more recently lab space. These days it’s a lot more than just the place where the Red Sox play.
I’m hoping Samuels will step in because keeping a food hall open in Fenway is as much about protecting his own investments. A spokeswoman for Samuels declined comment. As for the mayor, I’m told she and her team are in touch with key stakeholders.
Maybe Alexandria could find another tenant like a fancy gym or a national retailer, but even if they do, it won’t be the same as having 15 local small business owners from Ms. Clucks Deluxe Chicken & Dumplings (run by the team behind oya and Hojoko) to Blue Ribbon Barbecue to Union Square Donuts.
“We really enjoyed being at the market. We really enjoy being part of the Fenway community. A lot of people came to get donuts from us,” said Josh Danoff, co-founder and chief donut officer at Union Square Donuts, which has been at Time Market since it opened. “The market is worth saving.”
The clock is ticking, Boston. We’ve got a week before a food hall in Fenway goes dark. We can do this.
Shirley Leung is a Business columnist. She can be reached at shirley.leung@globe.com.