The Buck Stops Here: 9/11, Five Years Later

Robert Garber, OWNER, BITS BITES & BAGUETTES
22 PARK PLACE, LOWER MANHATTAN

“We were the first of our type in the downtown area when we opened in 1996, selling upscale, healthier, more cutting-edge food. September 10, 2001, was our busiest day ever; September 11 was poised to be even better. When the first building fell, we all heard it and felt it, saw people running down the streets, heard the screaming. When we were allowed back down the following day — we thought we would start giving away our food to the volunteer workers — we saw that everything had turned to garbage, so we just started giving away bottled water and sealed snacks. When we reopened months later, it was like starting all over again, and we actually didn’t start to feel the business turnaround until last year.

“Today our business is different than it was. Since the World Trade Center no longer exists and many businesses vacated, we have a lot more neighborhood people than business people, but hey, volume is volume. As far as what I have learned? Since that day, I have never again said, ‘What else can happen?’ when I have a bad day. Because I know what else can happen. And being here to tell the story accounts for a lot. We had many customers in the World Trade Center that are not here to tell their story.”

Gary Muhrcke OWNER, SUPER RUNNERS SHOPS
VARIOUS NEW YORK LOCATIONS

“I was here in our headquarters, the Huntington, Long Island, office, when we heard about it. We had just opened a store six months earlier on the WTC shopping concourse — all five employees got out. We dispersed our World Trade Center employees to different stores so that no one would lose their jobs. Our midtown stores all took a major hit as far as business was concerned, but our stores on the Upper West and Upper East sides were doing very well on the weekends — people were wanting to get out and get some release, via a pair of running shoes.

“Since the attacks, we opened a store on Seventh Avenue and 49th and are now in the process of building one in Brooklyn. And we are talking about going down to Lower Manhattan again at some point. It took us a little while to get over it mentally and financially... but what I learned was that I am the luckiest person in the world. We were able to forge ahead… remember, I am a long-distance runner and always will be. I’ve got a lot of stamina!”

Steven Saraniero, PARTNER, WILLIAM F. COLLINS AIA ARCHITECTS, LLP SEPAUKET, LONG ISLAND
“At the time of the attacks, we were doing a lot of work downtown with Verizon in their building on West Street, adjacent to Tower 7. As a consultant to Verizon, we wanted to help them get through this, so we went down to the Verizon building two days later with white suits and air masks to assess the damage. For the next few months, we lived an alternate reality: You had no concern for danger, you just wanted to move forward in the restoration and recovery effort. The building was a landmark building, a 1926 gilt-framed masonry building. The building has since been restored to its original grandeur — Verizon declared it their national headquarters in November 2005 [previously their headquarters had been on Park Avenue].

“What I experienced? I saw people, from all different points and places in their life, put aside their differences, their egos, their political affiliations and really focus on the task at hand. Metaphorically, the rebuilding to us was rebuilding the lives that were lost. And we all banded together to do it. From a business standpoint, that doesn’t happen very often.”

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