Here Are People Dragging the Hell Out of a Startup that Threatens Bodegas
“If you replace my bodega with a f**king box, I will launch you into the sun.”
Stephanie Keith/Reuters
A new startup called Bodega, launched Tuesday by Google veterans Paul McDonald and Ashwath Rajan, plans to install unmanned vending-machine-like pantry boxes in offices, apartments, dorms and gyms across the country, offering purchasable items that you might find at an actual, free-standing bodega.
This new box may be convenient for some, but it also threatens to push out mom-and-pop stores, many of which are owned and run by immigrants—a fact which Twitter is dragging, with “Bodega” trending nationally.
It doesn’t help appearances that the startup’s logo is a cat, a nod to the pets often seen pacing around brick-and-mortar bodegas.
They even took the name "Bodega" and made a cat their logo. I try to keep it clean on social media, but fuck these people. https://t.co/dXBtMeKSZw
— S. A. Chakraborty (@SChakrabs) September 13, 2017
Anyone who can go in a bodega and decide it needs to be made sterile and personality-free doesn't need to have money or influence
— Amanda Mull (@amandamull) September 13, 2017
Where else besides a #bodega can you buy those weird fig cookie things wrapped in Saran by the cash register?
— Susan Orlean (@susanorlean) September 13, 2017
my bodega owners are yemeni immigrants and the bodega not only affords them a life in new york but also allows them to send money back home
— Jessica Roy (@JessicaKRoy) September 13, 2017
if you replace my bodega with a fucking box i will launch you into the sun
— leon 🐣 (@leyawn) September 13, 2017
*Walks into bodega*
— Clumsy King 🤴🏾 (@CushKobain) September 13, 2017
Me: "Let me get a chopped cheese with grilled onion."
Bodega: pic.twitter.com/ftAzfSjSYl
anyway, if a store on the corner isn't convenient enough for you, it ain't convenience keeping you out of the bodega. it's the people.
— El Flaco (@bomani_jones) September 13, 2017
anyway, if a store on the corner isn't convenient enough for you, it ain't convenience keeping you out of the bodega. it's the people.
— El Flaco (@bomani_jones) September 13, 2017
Only way the Bodega thing could be better is if they teched-up the name, like "Bdega" or something
— Chris Mohney (@chrismohney) September 13, 2017
"Bodega cat.. i know this is sudden but you don't have to come to work today. Its an app now" pic.twitter.com/E5MyjcggPM
— Veteran Freshman (@yusufyuie) September 13, 2017
*Whispers into the void* I'm here for all bodega jokes because it feels like civic engagement during a time we desperately need it
— #rachelsyme (@rachsyme) September 13, 2017
The backlash to the terrible fake bodega startup is Media Twitter's first truly good pile-on ever and I hope it lasts all day.
— Alex Koppelman (@AlexKoppelman) September 13, 2017
Bodega secured funding from big shots at First Round Capital, Forerunner Ventures, Homebrew, as well as investment from executives at Facebook, Google, Twitter and Dropbox.
It launched 50 locations on the West Coast today, with plans to have more than a thousand by 2018.
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