Yes, it’s another smoke shop

I was kind of hoping this would actually be a bodega, but I guess I was smoking. Sure enough, we have another smoke shop — though at least this one is subtle with no ugly signage (yet?) and pleasant on the inside. (It does, however, have the requisite Astroturf on the walls and a spinner where you can win a free vape.)

The oddly named New Way Gift Shop (!) has opened just south of Los Tacos No. 1, at 136 Church and Warren. They have the usual products behind the register, and now also the usual foreign snacks: Oreos, Lays and Skittles from Japan, etc. Along with Birch Coffee, this fills in the empty storefronts on that stretch of Church.

I am impressed at what must be the massive consumption of illegal cannabis products: I think we are up to 10 smoke shops in the neighborhood. How??

 

7 Comments

  1. What gets me is that community members will turn out to oppose affordable housing but a shrug for a smoke shop.

    The reality is the probable best way to slow down or stop illegal smoke shops is to penalize land lords as well.

    If the place isnt ticky tacky like the rest of them, well I guess that is a good thing.

    • It really should be very easy to shut these places down, the politicians in this town just have zero interest in enforcing the law. They could shut all these places down tomorrow if they wanted to.

      • Yeah but at least they’re banning pizza ovens which are destroying our way of life in NYC :-/

      • If the counterfeit bazaar is any indication, no, the city has no interest in shutting anything illegal down. And the dining sheds? They are never leaving. In a year they would be ‘grand fathered in’.

  2. I don’t understand why these stores are referred to as illegal smoke shops. What makes them illegal? And if they truly are illegal, can’t concerned citizens call the police and report the illegal activity there and close them down?

  3. Comments like these with such dehumanizing, dog-whistling language should have no place here.

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