Rebirth In The Heart of San Francisco - Marisa Rodriguez, Union Square Alliance [San Francisco Sundays]

Josiah: Marisa Rodriguez is the CEO of the San Francisco Union Square Alliance, a former prosecutor with the San Francisco District Attorney's Office. She's now focusing her talents as a community leader to help shape what the next wave of San Francisco will look like. Marisa is a San Francisco native. In this episode, you'll learn all about the importance of public spaces, the importance of working together in the community and what's next for San Francisco. But before we get into that, here she is on why she lives in San Francisco.

Marisa (01:34):
I have certainly traveled quite a bit in my life, and I've been all over and there just really is no place like home. When I was a kid and I would travel the States and see different family friends and family members, I'd always say, Mom, when are we going back to San Francisco? I knew it was different. I knew people's ideologies and feelings and the way they approached life was different, and I sensed that I couldn't put my finger on it, but it just felt good, and it always felt good and always felt like home. And whenever I came back home and I recently had a conversation with a good friend of mine who's lived here for many, many years as well, and both of us would just talk about coming home after a long trip, just being like, gosh, so glad to be back in San Francisco. So this is my home. It continues to be my home. I still live here and excited for what's to come, our next reincarnation as a city, which is exciting. We always change. We always get to be something new, and I look forward to us reaching our full potential. This next set,

Josiah (02:43):
I am excited to talk about what that looks like, and it's awesome to hear the story of someone else who grew up here, but I think one of the beautiful parts of San Francisco is also just how welcoming it is. I feel like it attracts people who don't necessarily fit in from around the world and then they feel home here. And I think that's also really special.

Marisa (03:01):
And I'm an only child and a lot of my family here has been that sort of mashup of aunties and uncles that are just family friends that kind of maybe to your point, have come this way and are without their family and you just create a wonderful just mix of dynamic human beings who just love this place. And so it's a good way to grow up.

Josiah (03:24):
I love it. You're CEO of the Union Square Alliance, and maybe before we get into it, just to set the stage, can you tell our listeners what you do? What does this organization do?

Marisa (03:35):
Yeah, that's a really good question. Especially these days, I feel like I'm trying to do quite a bit in an easy way to understand it. We are a direct services organization. We provide service to our district, which is 27 city blocks and 660 parcels of property here in the heart of San Francisco. I like to call it our crown jewel, where basically every major transportation hub converges and where we love to come and celebrate life's greatest moments. It's just a special place. And so our job is to keep it wonderful. Our job is to do our part above and beyond where the city leaves off. We come in and add that extra bit of shine. About 75% of our budget is clean and safe. And what does that mean? It means you will see men and women in blue jackets sweeping up and power washing and also greeting visitors as they come to San Francisco with a smile and information.

(04:36):
Really excited that they're here. We are the gateway to the city. We are where the cable car turns around and makes its way up the hill to meet the stars, which is really exciting. A lot of history here, a lot of history, and we have a lot of culture and rich history that we continue to celebrate as the Alliance. We have a marketing arm, we have an activation sort of public realm arm is what we call it, so that any sort of public activations, lighting, flower baskets, beautification programs, concerts in the park, we put that out as well as advocacy. So I am the advocate in this organization and do my part to really try to bring as many resources to the community that we need to thrive. So quite a lot in some ways. I know a glorified HOA, we try to do a lot for the district.

Josiah (05:31):
You mentioned it being a crown jewel and for me it's really exciting to think about what this place is and what it can be. I was mentioning to you before we started recording as a kid, I used to live in the sunset, so people who don't in San Francisco, kind of the outer part of San Francisco boat, my parents would drive every holidays into Union Square and we'd walk around and do a little shopping and it always felt like the heart of the city for me, and I love that energy. And so I moved away for school and then I moved back and actually lived two blocks away from here. And every time I could, I would go and I would eat lunch at Union Square. In the middle of it, I just felt surrounded by the city, and so it's something really special. I'm curious from your perspective though, you have in this beautiful office, we're recording a photo from 1905 and you can see for more than a century, this place has been a place where people can relax. What is the role of public squares or public spaces such as Union Square to a city?

Marisa (06:28):
They take our breath away. You walk out of any building and to stumble upon nature, palm trees and oasis in the middle of a big city, a concrete jungle, so to speak. And again, kind of back to your first question about why San Francisco and why is it so special? It's so beautiful. It is so beautiful. I go all over, I visit other places and there are some amazing cities in the United States. San Francisco is one of them. And here in Union Square, it's a historic district. We have some beautiful ornate buildings surrounding this oasis of a square. You just don't see this everywhere. And beautiful high-end stores, you have the theater and walking distance, you have the museum district just a hop, skip, and a jump across market. You have restaurants and you name it all here, a cable car runs through it. It's magic.

(07:32):
And growing up, I've had the same experiences and I think so many people will share. There's a sense of a very strong sense of nostalgia in this community where, this is where I bought my prom dress. This is where my mom and I come for high tea. This is where we celebrate life's greatest moments. And there are businesses that have stood the test of time, have weathered so many ups and downs. That is our culture as a city built on so many rushes. And just down the street you have Historic John's Grill, they're celebrating their hundred and 15th birthday. We have the cable cards just celebrated 150 years. I mean, this is real and people are still here and some of these families are still here. So there's this real strong just sense of community and longevity in this space.

Josiah (08:29):
Yeah, I love it. And while we're recording this and why we're sharing this story is we want to tell the story of what's really going on in San Francisco. As somebody who grew up here, it feels the national media narrative doesn't match what it's like actually being here. And so I wanted to talk to people like yourself who have a frontline view into what is going on. I do want to talk about a tough moment in November of 2021. Some of our listeners may have seen it, but there was an incident with some looting downtown here. And for me that was not only incredibly sad, but kind of a low moment in the whole past couple of years going through a lot San Francisco, but obviously the world with going through the pandemic. But it felt like that was a really sad low moment. You've written in your annual report for the organization, what that was. I don't want to dwell on that moment, but I want to call it out because I think maybe that was the last time someone saw Union Square. What's changed since then?

Marisa (09:23):
First of all, I appreciate you even mentioning that because I think it's really important to reflect on where we were in that space and where we had been, where we were in that moment and where we were trying to go. Our city has grappled with certain challenges for decades. We have before the pandemic, we were coming off an incredible boom we'd experienced for really quite a long time, and we continue to kind of be in the spotlight, whether it's in the business arena, in the tech arena, innovation just always at the forefront and also in hospitality and as a beautiful special unique city that really kind of stayed at the top, at least top three all the time. And we really enjoyed that space. And we'll be at that space again. I mean, we have the ingredients for that. It's what makes us such a special place.

(10:21):
But understanding that and understanding that despite those challenges that we've been grappling with forever, I mean I think as young people, we remember those issues back then and scratching our heads coming out of the pandemic, those issues became a lot more front and center. And when you don't have about 150,000 people downtown like you once did, and even if as a city we are still enjoying a really low unemployment rate, we're still seeing businesses coming here and new innovations around AI and other things. That issue is more apparent and it is across the country, but here we're seeing it. That incident that took place, it was November of 21, we were still reeling from the pandemic people were still not downtown. We're realizing, oh gosh, are we going to get people back downtown? What does this mean? A lot of uncertainty. And then the most unprecedented crime type occurs mob style, looting overwhelming.

(11:32):
A number of stores in our Union Square starts to shift the narrative. And what's interesting about this, this event happened in a number of major cities across the country, and yet the news stations set up shop at the corner of Stockton and Gary for months to just bring home this story. And that was the major challenge that I wouldn't say the necessarily negative narrative was born, but in some ways yes, because it just brought all eyes here and then really kind of tried to showcase that. And so that was a challenge because to this day, you're seeing that same style of incident happening throughout the state, throughout the country all the time. It is not just a San Francisco story, and to your point, you can walk outside right now it's warm, it's really busy. Foot traffic is going up, it's trending upwards every day.

(12:39):
We continue to see more and more visitors. We continue to see people coming down here and enjoying what we just described, which is one of the most magical places in San Francisco in the world. And it's just such a shame because we want to move away from what wasn't actually an accurate depiction of what we're experiencing here and really the state of things. Yes, there are challenges, and yes, we're hoping our city leaders are addressing those things. We certainly do our part here in Union Square, but it is not the story. San Francisco is still a beautiful, vibrant, incredible place to live, work, and play.

Josiah (13:16):
It is now. And I think what you've spoken to a number of times is there's also so much more we can do. We have the ingredients, but I wonder, you mentioned 75% of budget going to this notion of clean and safe just on the safe piece. What's really fascinating to me about your perspective is not only are you CEO of this organization a community leader, but you went to law school and you also worked in the district attorney's office in the city. So that's actually a really rare combination. And I think my question for you, and you can take it however you'd like, but it would just be what have you seen or what do you hope to see from a law enforcement perspective to assist you in this goal of helping it being clean and safe?

Marisa (13:59):
Yeah, so yeah, I worked at the DA's office. I was a prosecutor, so I know exactly how this works, which has been really effective I think in my role, especially now. And even back to our conversation, I've been in this work for a little over a year and a half, which feels like sometimes seven years, but also yesterday there's just been so much happening and so much that we've accomplished as an organization to help the community, and that's been my main goal. Anything I can do, I run to the scene of the crime. It's kind of in my DNA and just the way that I've always been and really trying to help out as long as I can be helpful in this space. And so when we talk about clean and safe, I mentioned our ambassadors, that is just part of the story. Our ambassadors are out there cleaning, power washing and providing sort of a hospitality component.

(14:46):
Then we also pay for two overtime police officers to assist us calls for service. That could be an incident with tourists, maybe there was a, I don't know, an accident in the street, maybe there's something happening. Whatever it is, they come, we call them, they come, they assist. We also pay for 24 hour security, roving security, so we have security that can answer calls as well. And that's throughout the night. So that's been very helpful and certainly why it's 75% of our budget. None of this is cheap, but not just that, a lot of people don't realize, but the downtown is responsible for 75% of our city's GDP and Union Square is a part of the downtown. And as you know, we are a really strong retail sector. We are a really strong hospitality sector. We're 12,000 hotel rooms. Some of the most historic and beautiful hotels in San Francisco are here.

(15:44):
We host a large number of employees. People come to work in Union Square, the retail space, the hospitality space, you name it, they're here. And there are a ton of offices and other businesses in the building spaces above the first three levels, which typically tend to be retail. And so there's a lot of just economy here, and when things aren't going so well down here, it really impacts the greater city. And that is really ultimately what we're trying to protect here, because we need to feed our social services, we need to feed our law enforcement. We need to feed basically all the services that we need as a city to keep things going. And they come from here. And when people say the neighborhoods are doing well, which is so exciting, I'm sure for us we're really so proud of just how unique and different, and you can almost grow up in your entire life in one area and not see something else. But there's just so much character to this city, and I'm so happy to hear that we're doing well because we're home, but we are doing well in our neighborhoods. It still doesn't equate to what the Square and the greater downtown mean to the city when it comes to our bottom line. And so we are out here working really hard to bring the resources we need in the form of police officers, additional clean, whatever it is we think we need to support our businesses because our business needs our support now more than ever.

Josiah (17:25):
I appreciate you going into that because I think if we didn't talk about it, this may be where people get hung up on and they don't hear further, but it's sort of a baseline, but I appreciate the investments that are being made into these two pieces to create this environment that more and more people are attracted to. I guess thinking broadly from there, you spoke to a few elements of this, but I'd be curious to get your perspective on what creates a really vibrant downtown core area. Because what I'm picking up from some of the things you're saying is almost this ecosystem of so many types of businesses in a physically condensed area. Is that one of the key pieces that brings vibrancy?

Marisa (18:07):
Yeah, for sure. I've actually been known to say you can't pass go without clean and safe. So if this environment is not giving you a good feeling when you're walking around and you're enjoying our open space and having a cup of coffee and just walking around, which I am telling all this is a call to all Bay Area residents and San Franciscans, come back to your downtown. Just walk around, have a cup of coffee, your footsteps actually make the difference. We capture those footsteps to really try to attract new business here, and I know we'll get into that in just a bit and have the exciting nature of that, but to make community feel good, you just can't pass, go without clean and safe. So once that's established, then it is how can we make this dynamic? What can we offer in this space coming out of the pandemic?

(18:59):
We are different creatures. This is a new era. We want different things, and a lot of that is described as experiential and experiences. And I'll also say have to say this, retail is not dead. Retail is very much alive and well. I think about 4% of the market share is going to the online sale. Maybe you're still buying your groceries and maybe your larger linens and things you don't want to carry from a department store, but you want to touch the leather. You want to try on the jacket, you want to see things and experience them and know if that is in fact the handbag. You want the shoes fit all that. If I have another package that piles up that I'm not going to return, I'm going to lose it. So most people feel that way, and if you go to any strip mall in America or just even in the Greater Bay Area, you will see people are there.

(19:58):
They are there. They just want to feel good when they're there, and they also want to have an experience. So what we're seeing is I'm shopping, but I'm also, there's a cafe or I don't know at a bookstore, but I can have a cocktail, whatever it is, there's this desire for experience, and I think that's what's so exciting about this moment. I think that's so exciting about this moment because even though it's a pain point and we're seeing this transition and there's been a number of stores that have left the district, we're starting to see a number of stores coming back and they are ready to meet the moment. And so it just means we're going to get there sooner than we would have if we just kind of had to wait out the course of someone's business. And then something exciting eventually comes in. Now not only is this a great opportunity to invest if you are in fact in a position to do so. This is prime. This is the heart. Like I said, every major artery flows through here. Union Square will always be Union Square, 12,000 hotel rooms, right? Luxury, and they're having a huge boom. I mean, apparently coming out of the pandemic, we all just needed a Rolex. I'm not sure why, but we did. And these

Josiah (21:14):
Stores are open. I mean, just again, an interest of setting the record straight. Sometimes you see this, I don't know where it's from, but I just walked over here today and they're all open.

Marisa (21:24):
They're all open. Not only are they open, they're expanding, right? You're seeing where one store closes. For example, Williams Sonoma, oh, that made the news. Oh, oh my God. Guess what's going in three levels of Chanel to someone. That's a big deal. That's exciting. Right on the plaza, right next to Tiffany's, how exciting. And just imagine what that beautiful historic building is going to look like when they are done, right? Bottega expanded, Brunello Cucinelli expanded, YSL. Not only they moved and expanded. We're just seeing a lot of interest in the space. We have Rolex, Patek, Philippe Brightling coming on, streetside a watch,

Josiah (22:07):
Boom.

Marisa (22:08):
It's really exciting. A lot of these things, but not just luxury. We're seeing food and actually beverage taking off, and that's weird. We're seeing a bar explosion, nightlife scene, underground bars. There's one called Felix Ssf. It's under the bodega, the new Vietnamese restaurant that's really taken off here in Union Square. We have PCH, I think they just won a couple of awards. They are exciting at the holidays not to be missed. The decoration, they go overboard. And it's Pacific Cocktail Haven. Harlan Records a really cool vibe, and that's just in the alley off of Grant Street, which has become kind of our rodeo drive here in Union Square. We have some oldies, but goodies. I mean the number one, I think martini, they also just won an award. John's Grill won some kind of recognition for having the best old-school martini, which is really fun to kind of come down and feel that history here in Elements bar, there's a beautiful patisserie on O'Farrell called 1 6 5 on, I believe the second floor is a chocolate factory on the third. It's a bistro on the fourth, it's a Michelin-star restaurant, and on the fifth is this really cool bar that's curating drinks around the elements. So you've got wind, you've got air earth, we've got all these experienced fire that you can have here. And of course our hotel bars, they're really swank. The St. Francis has a clock bar. We've got the Beacon Grand now they have a whiskey room.

Josiah (23:40):
There's so much around here. And I think just to that notion of it's not only clean and safe, but becoming dynamic, I think where you start to experience that is for many different levels. I lived in the neighborhood, but then I worked in the financial district and there's kind of this opportunity to walk a couple blocks this way and then be in the density of what's going on. And so I think that's where I think some of the people who are coming in investing, it's not like we should do it to do something good. It feels like any sort of interesting investment always happens kind of early on a wave, and it sounds like you're describing what you're seeing as the next wave of what San Francisco can be. Yes. And so getting in now is

Marisa (24:20):
Chances the time to participate,

Josiah (24:21):
Right?

Marisa (24:22):
Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, yeah, there's certain generations and I've always felt like one of them, without saying necessarily my age, but I kind of always feeling like you're just missing that moment. And this is one of those moments and it's this narrative that we're combating as a city today is in my opinion, really tough to work through. It breaks my heart, but it's also going to get us there faster and better, which makes me really excited for what the future holds. And I think those who are positioned to take advantage of this great opportunity, amazing and lucky for them and for those who are here and stick this out, it's going to get amazing. I'm excited and I'm talking in the next couple of years. It's really, I mean, what a success story is 10 years, this is going to change sooner. Some of our challenges may take a little longer.

(25:19):
That's just the nature of that kind of thing. But I'm seeing a great future for our city and certainly for our square. We do need more positivity and we're getting it. The stories are coming out, the interest is here. Young people are coming in droves, they're checking this out. There's something here. They feel it. It's really nice to see. And what I also like is those who feel a real strong sense of nostalgia to the Square are also coming back and saying, wait a minute, this feels really good. This is not jiving with what I'm reading. And there are a lot of also clubs, like old clubs in the area and people are feeling like, oh, I can't go down and I can't experience them. That is in fact not true. And if you have a mom or a grandmother or a grandfather or a father, mostly the moms and grandmothers who are afraid to come down, call the Alliance, we'd be happy to provide an escort. You're going to see that you don't need one, but just come on down and make sure that you enjoy your recreation. It's here.

Josiah (26:21):
You got to see it for yourself. You got to see it for yourself, yourself. I guess one thing I'd like to touch on is how hospitality providers can join you in your work and be part of what's going on here, because I have listeners mostly in hotels, but also in restaurants and other forms of hospitality. You've spoken about how that plays a big part of some of the biggest hotels in the city are right around here. So whether it's people at those hotels or at a corporate office that has a presence here in around Union Square, what would you like to see from them in being part of this?

Marisa (26:57):
Yeah. Well, I think of the hotels in this ecosystem as the heartbeat, right? It's huge. There's a huge voice, like I said, our home to 12,000 hotel rooms, that's a lot of hotels and a huge community. That means a lot of voices, that means a lot of Instagram handles and TikTok and Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn. And if every single day or Hey, how about every Friday, let's start there. You walk around the district, you photograph something that you think is absolutely amazing, you go, you drink one of our many bloomed cocktails. It's a new initiative we just rolled out, union Square in Bloom. I'll talk to you about that in just a second. But there is a passport. You can go to our website and you can find this passport and also find 32 bloomed cocktails, drink responsibly in the district, take a photo of one or two, walk around, curate a moment at lunch, your salad, whatever in the park, and post about how beautiful the square is today and the great experience you're having.

(28:07):
Whatever it is, all of us in numbers can change this narrative. I mean, we know so many people, so many following us, all of it. Let's leverage that. Let's leverage our voices. Let's continue to push out the great initiatives. We have the holidays. They're coming up. We're going to blow it out, blow out your hotel, decorate like crazy, invite people, curate experiences, curate moments, do the gingerbread, do it bigger this year because we need it more than ever. And then when things start to get better, we'll scale it back. But now more than ever, I know it seems counterintuitive, but it's really the way to approach this type of thing. Like I said, we just need to get a few years out. We will get that message out there. But the holidays are huge for us here in Union Square. And then the other 10 months of the year, we've rolled out Bloom, Union Squares and Bloom.

(29:02):
I don't know if you noticed the bus stops have huge floral explosions. Our buildings are covered in Florals. Our stage is covered in florals in the park. Our garage entrances are covered in florals. It's crazy. Our hotel awnings, the hotels really made this happen this year, and I think it's been paying dividends and people are excited for next year. So last year was our first bloom. It goes from April to about the end of September. It kicks off with Tulip Day in March, and we really celebrate Mother's Day. But it's exciting. You can attach really anything to Bloom. We bloom pride, we bloomed Mother's Day, we bloomed cocktails, we've bloomed couture fashion. Did you hear the cable car? Oh yeah.

Josiah (29:46):
We got the full San Francisco soundscape...

Marisa (29:48):
Cable cars actually. And in fact, that might be the Bloom cable car going by. So I mean it's really, really special and a great opportunity to activate the space. And I know you talked about that a little bit, kind of what else? What does that mean to sort of activate and bring music and just so much creating a dynamic space, just so much to an environment that has so much to offer? Like you mentioned in the beginning when we were just talking as young people, we'd come down to Union Square to visit the hotels and we lived here, right? It was, let's see, the beautiful restaurant. Let's see the beautiful cafe, let's have the high tea, it's the holidays. Let's ride up and down the wild elevator. And to this day, kids still enjoy the clear glass elevators, for example, at the St. Francis. But there's this views at the Grand Hyatt and Michelin restaurant at Taj, and there's just all these beautiful things that are here, offerings we can bring our friends and visitors and guests to continue to enjoy our Union Square.

Josiah (30:52):
I appreciate that example of Bloom because for me, it highlights two things that are really important for people that are here, or if you're in another part of the world, you can kind of think about what this looks like for your community. But there's the piece around storytelling. You talked about digital storytelling. I think sometimes people have a too limited view on marketing or digital storytelling, and I think it's all about like, okay, it's about driving someone to book our hotel, and maybe that's a piece of it, but it seems like it misses the bigger opportunity around increasing the brand of the area, which is going to benefit you as a hospitality provider. But then there's also the piece around you have to create an experience worth talking about, right? We're lucky in San Francisco because just the natural environment we're in is an amazing way to, there's so much to talk about even if you didn't do that. But if you combine these two, it seems so powerful of great storytelling and also just create these moments. But in creating these moments, I guess maybe a third thing, but it seems like there's kind of a big emphasis on collaboration. It's like it was working with you and your organization and everyone else in this ecosystem. And so you need to do that. It's not just I work in this little business and I'm going to have this marketing campaign. It seems like a real community effort,

Marisa (32:02):
Big time. And this is where the alliance can come in and help amplify your storytelling as well. So work with us. Let's work with each other. You're putting something out for the hotel. We can amplify through our channels and work with other organizations together. We're a larger voice. What I think you're also trying to describe is creating FOMO here in the district. That's what we need to do. And that is sort of the new art space we're in when it comes to social media is wow, gosh, that looks really great. That meal, that concert, whatever curated experience is something that I'm going to do. Heck, I'm going to do it this weekend and I'm going to do sort of a staycation version of it. Let's bring our locals back downtown and having the shared experience growing up in San Francisco, I don't know if this was your experience, but we didn't go anywhere else.

(33:01):
You didn't travel across the bridge to go shopping. You didn't go down south. People came here and it's because look at how unique this is. You can be sitting in a even outdoor, let's say, outdoor mall anywhere in America and pretty much be in the same place. It looks about the same. It feels about the same. It has the same S stores. It's the whole thing. You cannot find another Union Square. And yes, we're going through a bit of a pain point. That is what it is, but it is certainly not going to be forever. And it's already, we're seeing the green sprouts. It's beautiful. People are coming out. I mean, you just look outside right now and there's just a hustle and an excitement. And I also want to say our park is getting ready to announce new operators for their cafe kiosks, and I think it's going to be really cool.

Josiah (33:54):
That's always been one of my favorite parts of Union Squares, those kiosks. 

Marisa (33:57):
That'll be really exciting to see. Yeah, I'm really excited and when it happens, we'll all let you know. 

Josiah (34:01):
Before we go, I want give you a chance to either plug anything that you're excited by and we didn't talk about or just invite people to get involved.

Marisa (34:10):
Number one call of action is going to be please get the word out. Come out here and leverage social media to tell a story. The real story that is happening in our downtown and Union Square. It is beautiful, it is vibrant, and people are out and about. You don't have to go shopping, you don't have to actually buy anything. Your footsteps are what we need. We need your footsteps so we can count you and attract new and exciting new experiences to Union Square to offer you when you come back. That's number one. Number two, we are actually the recipients of a grant with the city called Ssf Live. So we're piloting this grant until about October, where every Saturday and one day a month, we are hosting concerts in the park and it's Saturday and one happy hour date a month, usually on a Thursday, we are hosting a concert.

(35:12):
And we'd like you to come down and enjoy those concerts. And you can find all that information at our website. Visit unionsquare sf.com. You can also follow us on Instagram at @UnionSquareSF, and you can see all of the curated magic unfolding before your eyes here in Union Square and the holidays. Come on down, bring your family down. We get a lot of support from the city during the holidays in particular, so people have a safe shopping experience. So you will see uniformed officers present here, and of course our folks out and about the ambassadors, city ambassadors, police ambassadors, everybody's here. We'll have the ice skating rink, we'll have the Christmas tree, and we are hoping to have winter walk back, which is the closure of Stockton between Gary and likely O'Farrell this year, and hope to expand that out for years in the future. But come here, buy food at Food Trucks, and see Santa Claus and the Menorah. 

Josiah (36:20):
I love that. I appreciate the work you're doing. It was a lot of fun to chat with you today. So thanks for taking the time.

Marisa (36:24):
Yeah, thank you. My pleasure.