A series of national grocery store buy-outs has meant that several grocery chain stores in San Francisco are no longer profitable to keep open (Cala and Bell). They were probably kept open for a future sale in order to inflate gross revenue. Now a few neighborhoods will be without full service grocery stores. Several neighborhoods will have none within a reasonable distance.
San Francisco’s dominant religion (Lefty Fundamentalism) has led the city to post signs at all the entry points to the City saying: no chain stores in this City. San Francisco’s religion is far more intrusive in local politics, education and business than the Mormon Church is in Salt Lake City, or Orthodox Judaism is in Jerusalem.
So neighborhoods like Noe Valley and the Haight that have strict no-chain store policies have now lost their full service grocery stores and sure as hell won’t get any grocer to open a full service grocery store in such a hostile religious environment. It would be like wearing a Jewish star in Ramallah.
I call that religious self-immolation.