Starbucks Displacing East Village Coffeeshop The Bean

(The Bean on Flickr)

After almost ten years in business, East Village coffee shop The Bean (we remember it when it was called Kudos!) is getting the boot to make way for a cooperatively-run not-for-profit organic coffee kibbutz that will donate 100% of its proceeds to saving the manatees. Oops, correction: it's going to be Manhattan's 188th Starbucks. No surprise here—we are all Starbucks now—but what's funny about this latest Starbucks expansion is that The Bean didn't even find out about it until an interior designer for Starbucks showed up to plan the renovations.

"I said, ‘How can I help you?' " the manager, Guy Puglia, tells the Times. "He said, ‘I’m here for the renovation.' I said, ‘What renovation?’ He says, ‘For the Starbucks.’ I heard ‘Starbucks,’ and said to him, ‘Yo: You have to leave, now.' " Oh, but they'll be back! For the past year, The Bean, which is located on the corner of First Avenue and Third Street, has been on a month-to-month lease, and late last month they received a notice to vacate in 30 days.

It's a bummer for the neighborhood—with its free Wi-Fi, in-house computers, dog-friendly staff, and lack of corporate homogeneity, The Bean has become a sort of default meeting place for many locals, who leisurely swap the latest news and linger past midnight on weekends. All that's over once The Bean goes up Troy's bucket.

But it's not all bad news—the Times reports that The Bean will open a new location just a stone's throw away on First Avenue, at the southeast corner of Second Street. And maybe it's all for the best, because their current location (which was formerly the beloved Little Rickies, which was like Love Saves the Day on crack) has had some bad luck, with a cab crashing into it last November.