San Diego County feels some summer-like heat; temperatures up through Friday

S1: A springtime Santa Anna brings on the heat in San Diego.
S2: Between now and Friday. We're going to have to deal with these bone dry conditions , these unusually hot temperatures.
S1: I'm wearing CAVANAUGH With Jade Hyneman. This is KPBS Midday Edition. Pollution rates in California show evidence of environmental racism.
S3: When we think about black Californians , right , the piece of the economy that shut down didn't change the fact that they were still exposed to higher than average pollution even during the shutdown.
S1: California may need new tools to assess the ongoing cycle of drought and San Diego's bad mad vintage store scores number one in the nation. That's ahead on Midday Edition. We don't expect triple digit heat in April , but that's what some areas of San Diego are looking at today and tomorrow. With coastal highs nearing 90 degrees. Unseasonal Santa Ana conditions will kick up winds in the East County and reduce humidities throughout San Diego down to the teens. With Santa Ana's come , concerns about wildfire and dangerous heat exposure and also questions about why this is happening now. So joining me is National Weather Service meteorologist Alex Tardy. Alex , welcome back.
S2: Thanks for having me on again.
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S2: But what is unusual is to have a Santa Ana wind and on top of that have extreme temperatures. So , in other words , have a heat wave or a dome of high pressure right over Southern California combined with that Santa Ana winds. The two , they basically replace the sea breeze , our air conditioner , and they result in these excessive temperatures.
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S2: So right now as we speak , the Santa Ana wind is increasing. So that's the offshore flow. That's the wind blows from the desert to the ocean. It's pushing away , replacing the marine air that keeps us cooler in San Diego. And at the same time , above us is this massive dome of high pressure just pressing down on us. Now , if we didn't have the same in a wind , it would be hot over the deserts and the mountains. But because we have the sand in a wind that allows us to feel the same conditions as the desert mountains all the way to the coast.
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S2: That's what we'll see. Wind gusts of 40 , 50 miles per hour coming from the east Santa Ana fashion on the coast. Believe it or not , the winds are going to generally be light. And because they are , light means no sea breeze. So we're talking about temperatures even in coastal areas getting well in the nineties. I think there will be locations between I-5 and I 15 that top out at 100 today and tomorrow.
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S2: In this particular situation , we are protected for the most part because we are spring. So if you look along the foothills in your neighborhood where you're not irrigating , naturally we have a green up going on. So vegetation and grass is growing and it's green. That's what's going to protect us for the most part. Now , can we get wildfires with this intense heat and with these Santa Ana winds in the backcountry ? For sure. But we think because of this green up , that will help limit the size and aggressiveness.
S1: Now , people may not be prepared for such hot weather in early spring.
S2: You know , we're just not used to it in the early spring or in the winter or even in the late fall to have temperatures at record levels. So we're talking temperatures 25 to almost 30 degrees above seasonal averages in San Diego. We're talking temperatures topping out between 90 on the coast to 100 just inland east of I-5. So we're talking about temperatures that are unusual record breaking type temperatures for early April. So it can't catch people off guard. You have to take it serious. You have to hydrate. Humidities going to be down between seven and 15% , which means bone dry , thirsty type of thing. As if you are in the desert , you've got to prepare for as if you're in Palm Springs.
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S2: Short Santa Ana , it looks like the winds are going to go away on Friday , even in the back country. So by the time we get into Saturday , we're going to see a dramatic cooldown and shift to that sea breeze , that onshore flow that we know and love , the one that keeps the humidity up , keeps the temperatures down. But between now and Friday , we're going to have to deal with these bone dry conditions , these unusually hot temperatures. So deal with it today. Thursday , it'll be just as hot if not even a little bit hotter over inland areas on Friday. Big changes to start cool down on Saturday.
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S2: A big rainstorm in the fall or a very strong Santa Ana or maybe really cold or warm temperatures. It's always the thought , you know , is this a trend ? Is this mean that's something for the summer ? I think in general , individual events like this don't carry a lot of weight for the summer. But that said , it does look like the overall weather pattern that we've seen the past two years , drier than average conditions in Southern California , record warm 2020 , a very warm 2021 over our mountains and deserts , almost the warmest we've seen on record. The trend and what we've seen doesn't look like it's going to change much. So we should anticipate more of these heat waves even in late April , even in May , and then , of course , in the summer , there's no signal indicating that we will have a cooler than average summer.
S1: Okay , get ready. I've been speaking with National Weather Service meteorologist Alex Tardy. Alex , thank you so much.
S2: Thanks for having me on. Stay cool. Hydrated.
S4: During the pandemic , the air got cleaner across the state. A new study finds that was especially true in communities where Asian and Latino Californians live. But despite the shutdown , industrial pollution remained high in communities where black Californians live. The UC San Diego study suggests systemic racism could be behind the inequity. Jennifer Burnie is an associate professor at the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UC San Diego. She is a co-author on the study , which was published today in the journal Nature Sustainability , and she joins me now with more. Professor Burney , welcome.
S3: Thank you for having me.
S4: So your study points out that you were not expecting in a state that's as regulated as California to see dramatic differences in pollution levels. But you did. Describe what you found when you compared pollution across the state. Sure.
S3: Sure. Well , first , I think in California , it's widely understood that on average , minority and Hispanic Californians are exposed to higher average pollution levels. But this is due to a bunch of different factors that are hard to untangle. So we looked at what happened to pollution levels during the immediate pandemic response back in the spring of 2021 , when really all non-essential services were shut down and Californians were ordered to shelter in place. And what we saw was that sort of in the shutdown world , when all of these emissions of pollutants really were dramatically reduced , that the atmospheric environment in California was a lot more fair vis a vis Asian and Hispanic Californians than kind of the business as usual economy. And because , you know , environmental policy governs the emissions and control of pollution , you know , across the state , this is this is pretty strong evidence of a of a sort of systemic tilt , a systemic bias that that during business as usual conditions , we're sort of allowing our in-person economy to disproportionately affect Asian and Hispanic Californians. Hmm.
S4: Hmm. And the pandemic shutdown presented an opportunity for you to understand the levels of pollution in California communities during the economic shutdown. Your data shows lower levels of pollution in predominantly Asian and Latino communities , but in black communities , it remains high. Explain why that is.
S3: Yeah , that's right. This was sort of a really interesting divergence in the in the findings. Right. So black Californians on average before the shutdown were exposed to higher levels of pollution than non-black Californians , particularly white non-Hispanic Californians. And that didn't change in the COVID shutdown. So that that really means that the the in-person economy , sort of all the stuff that shut down in that immediate pandemic response is not the main driver of that disparity for black Californians.
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S3: So things like electric power generation , you know , some components of industry , but also , you know , the legacy of legacy of historic racist housing policy like redlining , which has been shown , you know , to have its fingerprint on pollution exposures for a really long time through to modern times. Hmm.
S4: Hmm.
S3: And what we see here is just when you add those all up , right ? Everything that shut down , everything related to sort of how transportation is laid out in California , you know , air traffic pathways , these things that really got dramatically curtailed , though. That whole system of governance of those emission sources is really tilted in a way that disproportionately affects specifically Hispanic and Asian Californians. So it's evidence really of a tip in the whole system of many , many different , you know , regulations of lots of different sources stacked up together , not one single policy.
S4:
S3: And we got to look at what happened sort of in that environment.
S4:
S3: So I you know , the first thing to say is what shut down during that period. And the biggest component was transportation. So road transport , you know , there was also a curtailment of of domestic and international air travel. And so when you look at what was shut down , the natural conclusion from this study. Is that policies aimed at emissions from those sources would be expected to help improve this the set of disparities facing Hispanic and Asian Californians. So transportation policy is a really easy one. I think what becomes more complicated is when we think about black Californians , right. The piece of the economy that shut down didn't change the fact that they were still exposed to higher than average pollution even during the shutdown. So it's other components of the of the economy and our policy environment that are going to need to change to fix that particular disparity. And so I think , you know , this this opens a little bit of a window on on how to get at the problem. But it also shows that , you know , there's no one solution that's going to address disparities faced by all non-white Californians.
S4: And what recommendations do you have for policymakers to ensure that there is more equity in the state down to the air we breathe ? Yeah.
S3: I mean , I think that , you know , this is this is nothing new. But we really need to have. Voices of all Californians be part of the policymaking process. I think what's a little frightening always about kind of systemic bias is that , you know , it was sort of put into place in the in some ways through through kind of legal processes. Right. A road was put in a given place and transportation routes were determined. And and none of that may have been explicitly biased , but the whole system is indeed tipped. Right. We see evidence of that. So I think really making sure that the most affected Californians are part of this process , know part of the discussion , part of meetings , part of stakeholder engagement is really , really important. You know , and I'd say the second thing we see is just we used a big network of privately owned air pollution monitors in addition to the public monitors that exist across the state. And that really improved our ability to measure these gradients at fine scale and to enter really diagnose the problem. So I think the other takeaway is that that all Californians can be better represented in policy. If we're really measuring air pollution at a much higher resolution , every neighborhood should know what their exposure is , and that's going to both get people involved and it's going to , you know , sort of make it impossible for regulators to look away.
S4: I've been speaking with Jennifer Burney , an associate professor at the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UC San Diego. Professor Burney , thank you so much for joining us.
S3: You're welcome. Thank you for having me.
S1: This is KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Maureen CAVANAUGH with Jade Hindman. California's rainy season is officially over and most of the state heads into its traditional dry season already in drought. Now , this year's Sierra Nevada snowpack is just 39% of average , but it's now more than the amount of snow and rainfall that determines California's water supply. Scientists say climate change has created a cycle of drought that is increasingly hard to reverse. And the old policy models that have been used to manage water in the West do not reflect those changes. Joining me is Dr. Andrew Schwartz. He's lead scientist and station manager at the Central Sierra Snow Laboratory at UC Berkeley. He wrote an opinion piece this week in The New York Times about what worries him most about the drought. And Andrew , welcome to the program.
S2: Thank you so much for having me , marin.
S1: Now you joined in measuring the years snowpack in the Sierra Nevadas recently.
S2: We did have several points where there would normally be snow sitting on the ground that were completely dry. And as you mentioned , we're only at about 39% of average. And actually since then , we've lost about another 10% in the last week. Wow.
S1: Wow. We are drenched with snow and rain last October and December.
S2: We've had this kind of weather whiplash going on this winter. We have the second snowiest December on record and then the largest December on record here at the lab , going all the way back to 1970. But unfortunately , in between those periods of big precipitation , we've also had very , very dry periods , some record dry periods , in fact , including one that went from November through basically the middle of December , and then another one that started in the middle of January and lasted for 37 days into the beginning and middle of February. And that's the longest dry streak during the winter that we've had here on record as well. So even though we've had that great precipitation , it's come in these large bursts and we still haven't been able to get back up to average where we would hope to be.
S1: And you write that the drought itself affects the Earth's ability to absorb that rain when it does fall.
S2: Yeah , that's correct. So one of the issues that we're always concerned about with these types of extended droughts or particularly warm periods , is that the soil itself will dry out and almost lose its ability to retain water , or in another case , depending on your soil type , can actually pull up so much of the water from any new rainfall that it doesn't make it into streams and then our reservoirs. And so as a result , the drought is kind of in a way self-perpetuating. We get this long period of dry soils and then when we get these heavy rain events , they can either be completely absorbed by the soil or cause flash flooding that then doesn't end up in the reservoirs where we necessarily need it.
S1: And of course , the drought is responsible for more wildfires in California. And the wildfires themselves apparently changed the way the snow melts. Tell us about that.
S2: That's completely right. Forest fires alter the way our snow melts. Oftentimes , we see faster melt as a result of forest fires because it removes that wonderful canopy in the trees. And then we end up with more incoming solar radiation from the sun , of course , to heat the snow. And it also means that we have less pine needles and branches to block wind , which increases evaporation. So these forest fires actually can potentially put us in worse drought conditions because we don't have the ability to manage the water coming out of these burn scars as easily , which of course then the following year can create more fires. It's kind of this awful feedback loop in a way.
S1: So considering that you argue in your essay that the models used by federal and state agencies to manage water during times of drought are outdated. Tell us more.
S2: Yeah , and I do want to be clear. Not that doesn't necessarily mean that all of them are outdated. There are many of them that are really quite good. But broadly , we have a lot of models that aren't sufficient in the West. And as a result , these are the ones that we really need to improve upon because these are the ones that we may need to use for managing our water. Of course , this is a complex issue because all of them have different needs. Some people need more money for the model itself. Some people need more money for people to implement these changes , and some people just need better weather forecast for their models. And so it's a complex thing and there's not one single hat that this issue can wear as far as one policy to fix it all. But it's something that we do need to address.
S1:
S2: Add indications as to what we can expect for our water. And many of these may not take our soil moisture into account. And so as a result , we are going to wind up with potential shortages.
S1: Now , San Diego has invested heavily in creating alternative water supplies. We have a desalination plant in Carlsbad. The city's pure water program will recycle water for drinking.
S2: Before I came out to work here in California , I did a lot of research in Australia and there's a lot of big parallels between California and Australia with climate and water , and they have implemented a lot of the same practices that San Diego have with reclaimed and recycled water , the desal plants , and that has helped prepare them for these very large droughts and the communities that haven't done that have wound up in pretty bad shape. So I would say that by taking these initiatives towards other solutions to water , San Diego may be better prepared than other parts of California.
S1:
S2:
S1: Now , you wrote this opinion essay about what worries you most about the drought.
S2: And some are far better than others. Like I mentioned , the National Weather Service has has much better models than some of the other entities that I've spoken with. So what we need from policymakers is to really develop as cohesive and comprehensive of an overview of all our water management in the West , and then try for large scale coordination and collaboration because individual entities working apart from each other , it's just going to create more problems than it solves.
S1: I've been speaking with Dr. Andrew Schwartz , lead scientist and station manager at the Central Sierra Snow Laboratory for UC Berkeley. And Andrew , thank you so much for your time.
S2: Thank you so much for having me on my.
S1: There have been developments in the investigation into this past weekend's downtown Sacramento shooting that left six people dead and 12 wounded. Police now say at least five people were directly involved in the shootings and that the incident was sparked by gang rivalries. Sacramento Bee reporter Sam Stanton joined Sal Gonzalez from the California Report with the latest.
S2: So Sam , what do we need to know right now about the investigation ? Well , the police here are going through hundreds of videos that were taken by bystanders downtown , as well as by police cameras and other cameras that are in the area. They expect to begin filing homicide charges relatively soon. So far , no one has been charged directly with any of the shooting that took place. There were more than 100 shell casings recovered from the streets downtown , but the only charges that have been filed so far surround prohibited persons carrying firearms. And why do police believe there's a lot of gang involvement in this incident ? Well , at least two of the six people who were killed have gang affiliations , according to the court records we've seen. They suspect that there are more with gang ties from those groups. There are various videos on social media online showing some of the participants discussing gangs prior to the shootout. And the evidence that they have seen doesn't reflect what they initially said , that it really wasn't a mass shooting as much as a gunfight on the streets of Sacramento. And just stepping back away from this particular mass shooting for a moment and to the gang landscape generally in Sacramento , is this something that's been on law enforcement's radar in the recent past ? Did they have an inkling that something like this could happen ? Well , there have been , you know , gang issues in the Sacramento area for years. Years back , the feds partnered up with local law enforcement to try and crack down on it. Part of the problem is there's been this pent up energy from the pandemic in downtown Sacramento. You know , until recently was virtually empty. And now that people are coming back out , the streets are filling up and the bars are very popular downtown. There was a rap concert at the Golden One center downtown on Saturday night. From what witnesses told me , the streets were just jammed with people from 1130 on until 2 a.m. when the shooting took place. And so part of the problem , I've been told , is that. There are crackdowns in some of the East Bay clubs on the people that are allowing into clubs there. So some folks are migrating to the clubs here. I don't know if that played a role in what happened , but there was some kind of volatile mix and there's a notion among some law enforcement that something happened inside this club that precipitated the shooting outside when when the bar shut down. And just looking ahead , I assume then three people have been arrested. Can you tell us what happens next ? Well , two of the people who were charged with carrying a firearm as a prohibited person have already made court appearances. The third was in the hospital because he was one of the 12 who was wounded. So he has not made his court appearance yet. The five who are suspected of being shooters may be separate from those three. There's no indication any of those three were involved in the shooting. As far as we know , they haven't been charged with anything like that. In fact , I spoke with one of them yesterday who adamantly denied any involvement.
S1: That was reporter Sam Stanton with the Sacramento Bee , who spoke with the California Report , Saul Gonzalez.
S4: Communities across California are having conversations about how to respond to the impacts of rising sea levels as a result of climate change. What you'll be hearing next is an excerpt from a California newsroom special called Climate Cost The High Price of Climate Change for California Communities. Reporter Cory Klein of Kbps PR in Fresno picks the story up in a community that has made the uncommon choice to pull back as the ocean rises. A policy called managed retreat.
S5: We begin in a small city on the Monterey Coast Marina with Bruce Delgado , a botanist and the mayor.
S6: We've already lost approximately 100 acres of our land to the ocean , and it's marching inland with the expanding oceans. And so we have to have a very closely followed plan not to build in an area that will have to be retreating from in the future. So all of the infrastructure below ground and above ground that are near the coast now are planned for what we call a managed retreat , that they have to move inland. They have to move backward as the erosion moves forward. And then the new development has to be outside of that managed retreat zone. You know , once it gets above five feet of sea level rise , I think right around 2100 , we have residential neighborhoods. And that's , of course , the most tragic thing that we would ever lose. You know , the private and the public. Landowners agreed that , yeah , if the ocean is coming , they've got to retreat. And the only question was what catalysts would we use to implement actions ? And so we've come up with what we call triggers. And if those triggers come to pass , then we have to take certain actions. You know , all this stuff is going to be very expensive and everyone's going to be competing against each other to get the same grants. And one result is it's going to be that there won't be enough grant money for everybody. And so it'll be one more source of pressure to force communities , big or small , to find more sales tax , find more hotel tax. We have a city hall and a staff. And I think a population that is devoted to our coastline and what we have right now is pretty good. But there's going to be problems that we have to deal with as the coast falls into the ocean. And so our focus is to address those issues. And it would be folly to create more problems by building new development that has to then be taken out or have the kind of controversies where private owners , you know , don't want to retreat that other other areas of the coast and California are having. You know , building seawalls is not a very reasonable approach for the long run. But there is an example where our cities have their choices. They can saddle the future generations. They can cherry pick and take the easy route and leave the hard route for people that aren't even here yet. Or we could take care of the mess that us in four prior generations made , and then the next generation can decide what land they want to use and how they want to use it.
S5: According to the California Ocean Protection Council. Communities in the state spend more than $400 million each year to clean up plastics. When marine plastic breaks down , it releases greenhouse gases. Such microplastics also limit the ability of plankton to eat carbon dioxide from KQ in Thousand Oaks. Lance Orozco spoke to a researcher in Santa Barbara working on a way to limit the harm caused by our bottles , bags and takeout containers.
S2: The plastic that makes its way into our oceans can stick around for decades , in fact , even hundreds of years. The process of breaking plastic down is helped by plastic killing microbes.
S5: One is that we might potentially be able to coat the plastic or embed living cells inside the plastic that are already able to degrade the material so that at the end of the product's life , the bacteria that could degrade the plastic are already there.
S2: The research team is also exploring adding nutrients to plastics that might speed up the process. They're starting work with plastics that oceanographers themselves put in the oceans , ocean sensors that measure things like temperature and salinity.
S5: It's actually more expensive to go back out and get them than it is to just leave them there. So lots of these sensors get deployed and then they never get recovered. And that's a really , really small part of the global plastic problem. But we figured that since we're oceanographers , that's the industry that we're going to start to work with.
S2: Santoro is confident that concept will work. The bigger questions involve the life span of the new plastics they're creating and whether more ocean friendly plastics are a truly viable alternative. In Santa Barbara , I'm Lance Orozco.
S4: To hear more of the program , climate costs , the high price of climate change for California communities , go to our Web site , KPBS dot org.
S1: They do their best to stay out of sight of people. So it might surprise you to learn that there are up to a million feral cats living in San Diego County in one part of the city. There is a unique place that provides care for dozens of these felines. KPBS reporter John Carroll takes us to this sanctuary where cats with nowhere to go find healing and love.
S2: At the back of an assisted living facility for seniors , there is something unexpected.
S5: So this is our Maine cottage. Welcome to Shanties House.
S2: That's Christina Hancock. She founded Shanties House five years ago , and it's not like she didn't have enough to do. She's both a lawyer and a critical care nurse. But then one day , while driving to an appointment , she took a wrong turn and found herself face to face with a feral kitten that would change her life. She named her shanty. She began driving to the neighborhood every day to feed her.
S5: Thought old trapper and bring her home. And then I discovered she was the tip of the iceberg.
S2: Hancock soon learned there were more than 60 feral cats in the area. She and a handful of volunteers started feeding them. Getting them spayed or neutered. Caring for their medical needs. But Hancock says she knew that wasn't enough. They needed a place and she had an idea. She contacted the owners of a nearby assisted living facility and proposed building a cat sanctuary behind the building. And so Shanties House was born.
S5: We have a ground lease for 12 and a half years for this. They gave us the space.
S2: The facilities management knew a good thing when they saw it.
S5: The residents love the cats. We come in in the afternoon and one of the residents will go. Sabina , his dad , Michael. Or they'll say , Sebastian and Michael , we're doing somersaults.
S2: So you might be wondering at this point , where is this special place ? Well , we can't say. You see , Christina Hancock says if people know where it is , she's afraid they'll be inundated with feral cats and they've already got all they can handle. And Hancock made sure to tell us that the abandonment of cats or any other kind of animal is a crime. But for the cats who are lucky enough to live here , life is good.
S5: And so this all happened very organically. First , we built the first cottage to get them out of the rain , and then we're like , Let's have a tree house. Then we're like , Let's have a waterfall.
S2: The sanctuary is divided into a series of pavilions , each one an oasis of calm , of healing. And when it comes to healing , shanties , House took a giant step forward a couple of months ago. Hancock took us to a recently constructed building. Unlocking the gates to give us a look inside.
S5: So this is the new infirmary that.
S2: We just felt.
S5: So cats can go in and out.
S2: But for the cats that don't need medical care , the vibe is still one of healing. Soft , soothing music and wind chimes are in the air. Every need of the cats is taken care of. But that means donations and volunteers are always needed.
S5: You can always use food kitty litter in volunteers , and we can use volunteers just to cuddle the kids that are now tame and want to be cuddled.
S2: Things are always changing at Shanties House. That's because the goal is to adopt the cats out once they've become tame. But if they remain feral , they can stay here for the rest of their lives. Christina Hancock hopes other people follow her model for a feral cat sanctuary. If you want more information or to make a donation , just go to their website. Shanties House dawg. That's SHC in t's house dawg. There you'll also see a lot of pictures of the feline residents and the volunteers who transformed this previously unused area into the place of beauty and love that it is today. John Carroll , KPBS News.
S4: You're listening to KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman with Maureen CAVANAUGH. San Diego Vintage Lovers Rejoice. A local consignment shop has been given the distinction of best vintage store in the country by online review site Yelp as determined by user reviews and ratings. Bad Madge and company , located in the city's South Park neighborhood , is a hub of upcycled , vintage clothing , niche home goods and other accessories curated from different eras of fashion and style. But what actually goes into running a vintage boutique , and how has the pandemic impacted how those kinds of stores operate ? Well , joining me now with answers to those questions and more is bad manager and company owner Tanya McIntyre. Tanya , welcome to the program.
S3: Well , thank you so much , Jane.
S4: So you've gotten this distinction on the heels of a pandemic that's been enormously disruptive to small businesses.
S3: The COVID pandemic was a huge disruptor for us when it first hit. It was in March of 2020. You know , the first week was really , really scary. I did a lot of crying and then I put my big girl pants on and said , okay , let's make this happen. The first thing that we did was we really turned to our Instagram and we had already built a pretty decent following , and that really was the game changer for us. We turn to our Instagram followers. We started doing a weekly sale , almost like QVC meets Ellen. So I'm a host and I hosted a Thursday night thing every Thursday , and we just went with it and it was very successful.
S4: And , you know , vintage clothing is an industry that's really seen a boom in recent years.
S3: I really liked fifties and sixties looks , and now it's a little more towards even the nineties. So we have had to incorporate other eras into our mix. And during the pandemic we noticed very huge shifts in what was selling. We didn't actually sell a lot of clothes during the pandemic. It's very difficult to sell vintage clothing without trying it on. It really is a kind of a thing. You want to be in the room with it , touching it , feeling it , putting on your body. Because vintage clothing fits very differently than modern clothing. So we were selling a lot more home goods. We couldn't keep a desk in our store , you know , for the life of me , because everyone was working from home and we saw real huge changes in what was selling.
S4: It's like you had to have those accent pieces for the Zoom meetings.
S3: Yeah , exactly. You know , or just , you know , a lot of people had blank walls and they wanted something nice to look at when they're at home. You know , and again , a desk we couldn't keep desks in the store because they went so fast because everybody needed a desk to work from home or , you know , go to school from home.
S4:
S3: And we are not a thrift store. We are a highly curated vintage store. And that makes a big difference in the way that we present our product. When I first opened , I relied a lot on estate sales and really going to garage sales and really spending a lot of time out searching for stuff. Now that I've been around for a while , I tend to get a lot of phone calls from people. Maybe they're downsizing , or maybe someone in their family passed away and they're dealing with all the items in the estate. And I prefer that because then I can work directly with the person and it makes it a little easier for me to go through the items in the home or maybe their clothing or whatever it is that they want to sell. I have a team of people that help me. We have seven people that work at the store. My operations manager will help me clean the item. Maybe it needs a little repair. Then the pricing part goes into it. So there's a lot of steps that make that item happen in the store. Pricing. I tend to look online formats like eBay or Etsy because those are now considered full retail. So if you're buying on eBay , that's retail for me. Even with a brick and mortar , I'm competing with eBay. That eBay customer can find that item anywhere on this format. So when someone comes into the store , they can look on their phone and compare prices to the item that's right in front of them.
S4:
S3: I like the aesthetic. Think Mad Men. One of my favorite shows right now is The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. That's my aesthetic. I think it's the old lady and me. I've always liked that look. I personally have my home decorated. With mid-century pieces scattered in with other things that I like. You know , I have a pretty eclectic style. However , I feel like it's really important to constantly be evolving , so we have been incorporating other eras into the mix. I do also like Art Deco , so I think it's just things that I personally like aesthetically wise. I do like a cleaner , more modern look , but I also really love color.
S4:
S3: When you're buying something old , one , it's made better , especially things from like the fifties and sixties. They were made so much better. So the quality is a big factor for a lot of people. And then also just having something that was loved before , that spark of joy when somebody buys something that was really loved by another person and it also is an economic engine , I think vintage is definitely a very strong economic engine , something I buy from someone , you know , maybe it was in their family for 50 years. I buy it. I bring it into my store. I might even have another dealer that will buy it and then they'll resell it. So it's this constant , you know , money exchange. So I think that's , again , a fun thing in nostalgia is a big factor in vintage people , you know , come in and go , oh my God , it looks like my grandma. You know , this is all the things I had in my mom's house. So I hear that a lot , that nostalgia of something that made them feel good , a piece of furniture. Sometimes it's just something that really speaks to you and that's really fun. We have a lot of fun at my store.
S4:
S3: They're so amazing. I have so many loyal , fabulous customers. I have just there's a lot of people that come in every day. I have several ladies that will almost come in every single day. There's a lot of local South Park people that just are walking by and they want to see what's in the store because we're always changing up the visuals and making it look exciting. So that's a big part of the way that the store looks and it's always being re merchandised and new items are coming in almost every day , so they want to see the new item. I'm so grateful to those customers because they have kept me open and kept the doors open because of their support. And , you know , there's a lot of , of course , newcomers. I have people from all over the world that come into the store. I had people from Canada , I had a young lady from Indonesia yesterday. So I try to engage with them when I'm there. And I have an amazing team that really makes an effort to get to know our customers and have fun with them. So it really is a fun place to be. You know , people tend to stay and listen to the music and dance and explore the store they want to. It's definitely exploratory. Nice.
S4: Nice. I've been speaking with Tania McKinney , the owner of Bad Majin Company in South Park. Tania , thank you so much for joining us.
S3: Well , thank you. I really appreciate the opportunity to talk to you.