SAN FRANCISCO — For more than 40 years, Jim Siegel has been doing what he loves on Haight Street in San Francisco. Distractions, a legacy business, is one of the famed neighborhood’s oldest shops. Sunday was his last day in business. 

“It’s bittersweet, I love the Haight Ashbury with all my heart. I opened up this business not to make money but to bring the Haight Ashbury back. It had very much been in a state of decline in the early 1970s,”  Siegel said. 

In the display window of Distractions, the clothing and costume shop he opened in 1982, there’s a 1976 photo of Siegel standing outside White Rabbit, his first store on Haight Street.

Siegel says the store was thriving up until the pandemic hit. Burning Man always led to a huge boost in sales, averaging around $200,000 every August. 

This year, he brought in less than half of that: $90,000.

“The city’s been in a little bit of a decline since COVID. A lot of it is the news media … the big news media saying ‘Don’t come to San Francisco.’ It’s criminal,” he said. “I haven’t been robbed in this store since 1982 was the last time I got robbed at gunpoint. In the 70s it was bad here and I did get robbed at gunpoint and knifepoint. The crime isn’t anything like that at all anymore. You know it’s property crime.”

Jim said online shopping has taken a chunk of his business but the biggest hit came after COVID. Tourists still haven’t returned.

His monthly rent is $7,000. 

“Sales have been going down and I just realized I’m old and I was hoping some new blood would buy this store. I was trying to sell this store or give it to my employees and it needed to be reinvented a little bit and that isn’t happening,” Siegel said.

He said employees don’t have enough money to keep the store going.

On Sunday, everything in Distractions was half off.

San Francisco native Noah Dewald wandered into the store for the first time and scored a coat for his wizard costume for Halloween.

“I’ve seen a lot of mom-and-pop shops close down in the city and it’s always sad to me but it sounds like it’s the owner’s choice and he’s moving on with his life,” Dewald said. 

“Everything I wear I got from Jimmy. This hat I got 17 years ago,” said a longtime customer, who goes by “Pappa Bear.”

He’s been stopping in multiple times a week for 25 years.

“This store is going to be missed because there’s not another store like that,” he said. 

Siegel said he will hold a special event at his store Tuesday morning at 11 o’clock. 

He still believes the Haight is a flourishing neighborhood.

“This store has blessed me very well. I invested all in real estate over the years so I’m set for life and I can afford to retire now at 67,” he added. “I’ll be more of a hippie now that I’ve retired. It’s in my heart. I will always be a hippie.”

Betty Yu

Betty Yu joined KPIX 5 in November 2013 as a general assignment reporter. She spent two years at WTVJ, the NBC-owned station in Miami, as a reporter before moving to San Francisco.

The post Eclectic San Francisco clothes retailer closes after 41 years appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

A San Francisco women’s boutique clothing store visited by celebrities including Alanis Morissette, Courtney Love and Steven Tyler will be closing its Marina location in October after operating the spot for nearly two decades.

Ambiance owners Donna and Kieran O’Leary have decided to retire after the couple turned 69 years old in January and December. 

Only the Marina location faces closure, which is slated to happen around mid-October, according to a letter the owners sent to the store’s newsletter subscribers.

The Inner Sunset location at 756 Irving St. will stay in business as Ambiance’s only remaining store. The location has been sold to the store manager and Ambiance’s director of operations. New co-owner Gwen Lee-Rios declined to comment when reached by phone due to the store being too busy.

San Francisco women’s boutique Ambiance has sold women’s clothing since 1983, operating six stores in that time. The Marina location, pictured above, will close in October. | Source: Donna O’Leary

Both locations will have blowout sales—starting with 25% off everything in the store. The sales will be exclusive to subscribers on their first days. After that, the sales will open to the public, and prices will continue to drop until everything is sold, the letter to customers said. 

The Inner Sunset store’s sale starts Thursday, from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., while the Marina store sale begins Sept. 14.

Donna O’Leary said she was relieved to step back, but called the departure bittersweet.

“People think it’s glamorous because it’s fashion, but retail is a lot of work,” O’Leary said. “It’s time for a new generation to take over.”

O’Leary said she doesn’t know the new owners’ plans for the Inner Sunset store, but whatever direction they take, she hopes they will continue the store’s practice of offering fashion advice, which she calls key to good customer service. 

“They’ve got to stay true to Ambiance,”  O’Leary said. “The name means something to San Francisco.” 

Ambiance, a San Francisco legacy business, had multiple locations over its 40 years of serving San Francisco, first opening in Haight-Ashbury at 1458 Haight St. in 1983. A second store opened in Noe Valley on 3985 24th St. in 1999 before moving up the block in 2014.  Stores in the Marina and Inner Sunset followed in 2002 and 2011. The O’Learys took over ownership in 1996 from founder Gloria Garret.

The store is known for its vintage-inspired clothing and accessories including purses, blouses, jackets and dresses.

The original Haight Street store saw its share of celebrity visitors.

O’Leary remembers Steven Tyler’s visit, which she said happened in the early 2000s when Aerosmith was in San Francisco for a concert. She said the rock starr signed autographs and took pictures with fans.

“He was the biggest sweetheart,” O’Leary said.

Alanis Morrisette also shopped there several times throughout the early 2000s, often when she was playing in San Francisco while on tour, according to  O’Leary.

“She would just stand in line like a regular customer,” O’Leary said.

The original Haight Street store closed in March 2020 at the start of the pandemic, but  O’Leary said she is glad at least one store will carry on.

“I’m really glad Ambiance will carry on in San Francisco and make women beautiful,” she said.

The post San Francisco Ambiance Clothes Retailer Closing After 19 Years appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.