Corner stores in NYC have some advantages, competition. If

In the burbs and rural areas, the stores are spread out, and if you have a shitty store a couple miles closer than a decent store, they can just produce the cheapest crap and sell it to you for exorbatent prices.

New Yorkers are ok with walking a few blocks. So if your corner shop can’t complete another one 2 minutes away will draw away their customers.

Even corner shops in Baltimore and DC are pretty anemic comparatively, but they tend to have more actual restaurants peppered about.

Keep your bodegas. Ain’t none of you guys can beat our local gas station/post office//DMV/liquor store/UPS pickup point. We don’t even need a special name for it. It’s just The Store. Sure it’s not within walking distance. But then not even the neighbors are either.

You can fill up your car, get your mail, buy new tabs for that car/boat/UTV/truck or get a fishing/hunting license, buy a 12 pack of beer, send a fax to your parole officer, and buy a gallon of milk with a frozen pizza to either cook there or take it home. It also has 2 tables and 5 chairs to relax at, (no purchase necessary). I know people who do all of that in one visit.

I’d be blissed-out to have a bodega near where I live. It’s over a mile - with nothing else in it- to the nearest gas station. And NYC has 13,000 of them!

As for the byatch that lives to create posts that piss people off? Honey, you may reap all u sow ten times over!

boodegas, you say, and you’re not a little bit suspicious that it is far too close to the term bottega, italian for general all purpose shop and conmercial activity? like, ‘aprire bottega’ - ‘starting a business’? And i know for a fact that NY is full of Italians.

These comments are so weird. I only found out what a bodega was recently, so I’ve added it to my brain as “corner shop”. I didn’t even know they were peculiar to a specific area until this post.

So they’re corner shops. Everything people comment about them being different still comes under the umbrella of “corner shop”. It’s weird to see people yapping about how they’re different and then giving reasons that… still mean corner shop.

I’ve heard some bodegas have cats

Huh, I’ve always assumed that a bodega is a shop akin to those Japanese 7-11 stores. Like the kinda store that you see in those CCTV recordings of horses breaking through automatic store doors.

Bottega Is Italian for shop/boutique Just a small buissnes selling stuff Is a bottega. Maybe they even reapair the kind of stuff they sell. Usually It Is oercives as and old Word so a shop that want to gibe annold time vibe Will have name Antica bottega (ancient bodega) or bottega del gusto ( bodega of the taste). Anyhow fuck usa

What’s disappointing is that bodegas are as close to a “third space” as you’re likely to get. It’s not a place you’re meant to hang out, there isn’t even seating, and you are supposed to buy something. And yet, there’s a hint at some kind of community.

UK, Ireland and Australia have a slight improvement on that with pubs. They’re also commercial establishments, but culturally it’s more of a community thing. It’s also not just about alcohol. You can get a hot meal too. Even if someone isn’t going out to hang out with friends down at the pub, it’s often perfectly normal to go there and eat alone while reading a book. Even that is a bit of a community activity, because you’ll see some of the same faces and exchange greetings or at least waves or nods.

Places with serious winters (and I’m including NYC in that), really should have third spaces that are not for profit and designed for various kinds of hanging out: board games, indoor sports, gaming, cooking. That just doesn’t seem to be a common thing in the English speaking world, at least for adults.

Hey man, sometimes they have cats

In Denmark ‘bodegas’ are essentially pubs that might serve food, but very often are just for downing pints.

I’m from Chicago and I’ve never been to NYC. From what I’ve heard about bodegas however, the difference seems to be that a bodega requires a cat.

So after reading through all the valuable comments here it seems like a bodega is a way to say you live in New York while trying to not seem like you’re bragging about it but you actually try to brag about it

One of the main things I miss from the UK is the cornershops - generally run by an Asian family and you can find almost anything a human could possibly want to buy in there with “multipack, not for individual sale” writ on the side.

Australia used to have milk bars, which were basically the same thing, but they’ve all been closed down or gentrified into delis and brunch cafes.

NYC here.

If someone asked the average New Yorker what a bodega was, the most probable answer is “What are you, stupid?”

Not me, because I would be mugging you.