tl;dr I was wrong.
I used to go to a restaurant that I was sure was a front.
Years ago I was walking home from the gym and I got peckish. I was in one of the less fancy areas of Manhattan so I didn’t think twice about just walking into the first place I saw.
The second I walked in I decided it was a big mistake. This place looked fancy. Nice place settings, real wood furniture, etc. I was dressed like a bum and probably smelled bad.
But the head waiter came out and treated me like royalty. Fresh baked bread, a sauteed flounder that he filleted right at the table and all around baller service at a very reasonable price. I was the only person there but it was early so I didn’t think much of it. I figured that if their food and service was this good when they thought I was a bum this is the place for me. I dropped a 100% tip and decided I’d go once a week and if I ever found a date I’d impress the hell out of her when we roll into a nice restaurant and the head waiter greets me by my first name and treats me like a big shot (aside: the first and only girl I brought there didn’t like their vegetarian options but ended up marrying me anyway).
Ever time we went the place was practically empty. This was one of the less fancy areas of Manhattan but they were still paying Manhattan rent. The food was always top notch and did I mention how awesome the service was? Mooci, the waiter once came back from vacation and insisted that I try some of the moonshine from his Sicilian Mother. Constant freebies too.
We decided there’s no way they could be turning a profit and assumed it was a mob front. Some older NYers may remember when the story broke that SPQR was a mob front, so it seemed pretty likely.
Well a few years ago we went back after moving out of state. The restaurant was under new management and everything sucked. Crappy place settings, shitty generic food and I didn’t recognize anyone there. It turns out they weren’t a mob front. They were just great cooks that sucked at running a business and ran out of money :(
I mean, Sicilian and living in NY, I would suspect it was a front too.
There is a Psychic and Tarot card place in my town that I never see anyone going in or out of but always has at least two or three high end sports cars in the parking lot. Something is paying for those cars and it ain’t palm reading.
A lot of car washes popping up near me with a monthly fee unlimited washes program that I’m positive is just a better version of what Walter did in Breaking Bad. Scan your app’s QR code and away you go, meanwhile someone behind the scenes rings it up as a cash sale and throws $15 into the till.
Town of 20k people, we had a wool shop… just sold wool only. Always thought it was a front, years later found out they won the lotto(2mil) blew it all keeping the wool shop open almost 10 years with zero customers lol
God damn, were they just that committed to wool?
I knew a guy in my town who worked a shitty job at the Oasis factory making the green foam that florists stick flowers into, just so he could keep a tiny book store he owned open. As an adult, I now wonder if he also sold weed on the side.
Aww, that’s touching. I hope his store made him so happy that he didn’t care about his foam drudgery
Tax write off, get thee behind me, capital gains tax!
Yup. Currently here in NZ, and there are a few almost-always-empty eateries that even survived COVID. Very sus overall haha.
There was (maybe still is) a cake shop in Southgate, North London. About a minute from my old flat.
The cakes in the window display rarely changed, if ever.
The guy running it looked like if you imagine the toughest prisoner at a prison, only wearing an apron.
About 50/50 whether the glass would be smashed whenever you walked past.
It was often “open” and had people coming in and out of it at 2-3am when I came back from nights out.
And there was a drive-by shooting right in that area while I lived there, that I always assumed was related. 😅
Every mattress store
Have a furniture store in the small downtown area of my town. The entire building looks cigarette stained. They have brown tint on their windows, and peering inside, all the furniture looks crazy old and probably not something you’d want to buy.
On top of that, they’re open “by appointment only” and that’s just about the only sign they have other than the name of the business. Never seen anyone go in/out. It’s in a major location too, “Main street”, there’s no way it’s a real thing.
There’s a legitimate pizza place around me that’s been around for ~50 years. My mom went to school with the owners children and when she was in high school their dad had a small stint in jail for tax evasion and unregistered and hot guns. Apparently he was importing a lot of guns from Italy and one day a shipment got caught. About 10 years ago, my mom became friends with someone who was hired to do their taxes. She didn’t give any details, but she told us the numbers really didn’t add up and she had to drop them as a client their first year due to ethical reasons.
The thing is the pizza is really good and kind of an institution in my town. I wouldn’t say it is strictly a front, but money does move through it. The family also owns a lot of small strip malls in the tri county area and some historical properties as well.
Oh and one of the sons married one of their 2nd/3rd cousins from Italy in the 90s. The rumor was it was just to help her get citizenship but they are still married to this day and it’s kinda weird.
Might be a sham marriage but a Catholics gotta Catholic
Funny part is the tax lady who refused to do their taxes was a confirmation sponsor of one of his grandkids.
There’s a microwave repair store in my city.
There’s always one person there when I dive by but never any customers. There’s a neon open/closed sign that changes daily so someone is there.
No clue what exactly is going on there.
I mean, you can try to have them repair your microwave
This tiny hidden pizzaria place that is always closed for private meetings. Called Pizzaria Mafiosi. Hidding in plain sight.
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Matress stores.
Never see anyone in them, never see anyone in the parking lot, and every time i’ve ever gone in there was one person working there who acted surprised as hell someone came in.
and yet they are always expanding and building more locations
That actually was a kind of scam:
There are more matress stores than just MatressFirm doing it.
I have a shop near where I live in the middle of a suburb that only sells fans (the wind blowing kind) and they are a DHL pickup point, everytime I am there there is nobody there. The fans are stacked in boxes up to the ceiling and the quantity of them never changes, been that way for over a year now.
There is also always a shady ass person behind the counter, and often a few shady persons in the “back” of the store.
Since they only sell fans they should’ve called their store OnlyFans come to think about it .
