Shop Talk: Shop Talk: Mephisto closes on Fourth St.; Selling soap from Palestine; Zebra’s 40 years of tattoos

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Find out which stores have opened, closed or moved and what’s new in Berkeley’s nonprofit, retail and small-business communities. If you have updates to share, send an email to [email protected].

Closed Fourth Street

Mephisto walks away from Fourth Street

Mephisto, open on Fourth Street since 2004, has closed. Credit: Tracey Taylor

Mephisto, the specialty shoe store on Fourth Street, is closing after 20 years. 

The shop was opened by Safet Halilovic and his wife, Inge, in May 2004 and sold a wide variety of leather shoes, sandals and boots for men and women. The Halilovics still run a Mephisto store in Walnut Creek, which they’ve operated since 2002.

The Mephisto brand, which has more than 900 stores worldwide, was started by Martin Michaeli in France in 1965, with the goal of creating “the world’s finest walking shoes.” 

Mephisto Berkeley, 1799-C Fourth Street, Berkeley.

Closing West Berkeley

Declining sales prompt Uchi furniture store to close

Uchi is currently liquidating. Credit: Nathan Dalton

Uchi, the West Berkeley specialty furniture store, is closing after six and a half years. The shop is run by Yo Akino, who worked for 22 years at The Wooden Duck, the longtime Berkeley-based furniture store. When The Wooden Duck closed in 2017, Akino decided to open her own business, and found a space that had once housed yet another furniture store — Fenton MacLaren — on San Pablo Avenue near Gilman Street. She chose the name Uchi, which means “home” in Japanese, for her new shop.

“I am excited to open my own business and keep providing the Bay Area community with the quality affordable teak garden furniture that The Wooden Duck was known for,” Akino said in 2018. But declining sales over the last few years, partly spurred by pandemic-era supply chain issues, have forced her to close the shop. 

“The stress is not worth it,” Akino said in an email.

Akino is a Berkeley native and the daughter of entrepreneurs. Her mother ran Moon Basket, which Akino said was Berkeley’s first futon store, and a clothing store called We Bebop after that. Her father ran a construction company called Dolphin Woodworks. 

Uchi is holding a going out of business sale, with up to 40% discounts storewide, until Nov. 17, when Akino plans to close the shop’s doors for good. But the sale may extend beyond that date as Akino has a month to leave the space. 

Uchi, 1325 San Pablo Ave., Berkeley. Phone: 510-775-7580. Hours: Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m.- 6 p.m.; Sunday, noon-5 p.m. Connect via Instagram and Facebook.

In the Spotlight North Berkeley

Palestinian Soap Cooperative sells ancient soap and other goods imported from Palestine

Dina Omar inside the Palestinian Soap Cooperative workshop. Credit: Nathan Dalton

Soap has been made in the Palestinian city of Nablus in the same way, with the same three ingredients — olive oil, water and lye — for millennia. Nablus soap is the precursor to Castile soap, and is still prized around the world.

“It’s a very ubiquitous product in Palestinian households,” said Dina Omar, whose love of the soap prompted her and her husband, Chris Hebdon, to found the Palestinian Soap Cooperative, which they run out of their Berkeley home. 

Omar was born in Chicago and grew up in Southern California, but was surrounded by a tight-knit Palestinian community. Siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and extended family were always around. 

“I was in Southern California but was nurtured by the kind of values of the village that I’m from, which is called Rammun,” now in the West Bank, said Omar. 

Children’s art adorns the walls of the Palestinian Soap Cooperative workshop. Credit: Nathan Dalton

Nablus soap was the only soap her father used because he was sensitive to the fragrances in most commercial soaps. Omar herself became sensitive to synthetic fragrances when she became pregnant and started using Nablus soap. It’s the only soap she uses to bathe her daughter. Her husband uses it as shampoo. The family uses it to clean carpets and clean clothes.

“We really use it for everything,” she said. “I think another thing about growing up in a Palestinian household, one of the huge values that we have is thrift and how to manage waste and how to not be wasteful. So I think this soap is a part of that story.”

The problem was that Omar and Hebdon had a hard time finding the soap in the U.S., especially while living in Connecticut where they were both in the doctorate program in anthropology at Yale. So they decided to go to the source and order soap directly from Nablus. They soon realized the demand for the soap in their community, and began ordering it by the palletful, and launched Palestinian Soap Cooperative in 2021. When the couple finished their studies at Yale, Omar took a lecturer position at UC Berkeley — the place the couple first met as undergrads — and they brought their burgeoning soap business with them.

Palestinian Soap Coop sells soap from 13 different producers representing seven brands via their website or in person during select hours, with prices ranging between $3.50 and $6 per bar. A six-bar soap box costs $28.

Soaps made in Nablus, sold by Palestinian Soap Cooperative. Credit: Palestinian Soap Cooperative

“Every customer comes by and asks us what’s the difference between the soaps,” said Omar. “And I say that there is no difference, but the reason why we didn’t want to just carry one brand is because we didn’t want to create a culture of competition. So if you have soap, we’ll sell it.”

The coop also sells loofah mitts ($15) made in the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank, kufiyas from Nablus Textile Company ($20-$40), and spiced coffee roasted with cardamom and nutmeg from Gaza Coffee Company ($20 for an 8-ounce bag). The coop also carries Palestinian olive oil available for direct purchase only. 

Running this sort of multinational business, with international shipping and importing, is difficult, said Omar, but with the war in Gaza, it is especially challenging. 

“Overall the campaign against Gaza has meant the locking down of the West Bank,” said Hebdon via email. “International wires are the only form of payment now allowed … and even when money gets to the West Bank our coworkers can only make internal transfers of $2,000 a day. There are layers and layers of the onion that go like this.”

“But it also feels very much like a gift and a blessing to be able to tell a Palestinian story through a product where you’re not sort of over-determining what people ought to think about things,” Omar said. “So it’s been bitter and sweet and good and bad and very, very difficult at times.”

Palestinian Soap Coop is a family affair. Omar and Hebdon’s 4-year-old daughter is always around, and her art adorns the workshop’s walls. Omar’s teenage niece drew the art for the workshop’s entrance in lieu of a shop sign. Omar’s mother, who grew up in Palestine and came to the U.S. in 1974, works for the business. Noor Khashe, another employee, described working there like “being at my family’s house but without the baggage.”

Khashe first came into the soap coop’s circle when she was audited a Palestinian poetry class taught by Omar at UC Berkeley. One of Omar’s favorite poems is “Twigs” by Taha Muhammad Ali, which they include with every purchase. 

“In particular, this middle stanza has a lot to do with the sort of values of us as a company and what we’re trying to offer customers,” said Omar before reading it out loud:

Palestinian Soap Cooperative, 1080 Monterey Ave., Berkeley. Phone: 510-973-5835. Hours: Monday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Connect via Instagram and Facebook.

In the Spotlight Telegraph

Zebra Tattoo & Body Piercing celebrates 40 years

Zebra Tattoo & Body Piercing in Berkeley, around 1993. Credit: Zebra

It’s easy to forget, but there was a time when tattoos and body piercings were signs of rebellion. The stuff of bikers, outsiders, freaks and weirdos. But looking at the long line of customers waiting to get into Zebra Tattoo & Body Piercing on a typical afternoon, it’s clear that those days are long gone. 

“We have every walk of life coming into Zebra,” said general manager, Sean Delfani. “You come into our shop and you’ll see people covered from their scalp down with tattoos and piercings, but then you’ll also see baby strollers and moms coming in with their sons getting their first piercings. And we have senior citizens celebrating their 90th or 100th birthday coming in for their first tattoo.” 

Zebra is celebrating a birthday of its own this year — its 40th — and through its history has been able to ride the wave of trends. 

It was founded in San Francisco in 1984 by Moe Delfani, an Iranian immigrant who came to the U.S. on his own at age 16, and his wife, Siobhan. Known then as Broadway’s Rock, it catered to area punk rockers and heavy metal musicians looking for leather clothing, boots, bracelets and other accessories suitable for the rock stage or the mosh pit. In 1989 the shop moved to Polk Street in San Francisco and started offering tattoos and piercings, which went over so well with its customers, the shop changed its focus completely. It also changed its name to Zebra.

Zebra as it is today. Credit: Zebra

The shop moved again in 1993 to Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley, where the Delfanis felt right at home at the center of counterculture in the East Bay. It was also a home of sorts for Sean, who spent a lot of time in the shop as a child.

But Sean had no intention of taking over the family business when he was younger. He went to the University of Arizona, where he ran track and studied business. He moved to Los Angeles after graduation, where he worked in the hospitality industry, helping to open and run hotels, including the Waldorf Astoria in Beverly Hills with the Hilton Group. 

But his career plans changed when he visited his parents for Thanksgiving a few years back and learned that Moe was pondering retirement.

“They put their whole life into Zebra and were kind of getting to a point where they were just looking for the next step and they were at somewhat of a standstill,” said Sean. “And then a couple weeks later I came back for Christmas and I told him that I wanted to join the family business and continue what he started.”

Sean has no regrets and admits that running Zebra — both the Berkeley shop and its Walnut Creek location, which opened in 2008 — is a lot like running a hospitality business. And he loves the charged atmosphere of the shop, full of excited and nervous people about to get tattooed or pierced. 

“There’s a lot of emotion, and a lot of fun energy coming into the shop every single day,” he said. “That energy is very contagious because we’re the ones guiding them through that process. So we’re able to be a part of that process for hundreds of thousands of people over the years. It’s a really special place and you have a lot of fun every day.”

Zebra Tattoo & Body Piercing, 2467 Telegraph Ave., Berkeley. Phone: 510-649-8002. Hours: Friday-Tuesday, 11:30 a.m.-7 p.m. Connect via Instagram and Facebook.

Moved West Berkeley

Looking Glass makes a bet that smaller is better in new move

Looking Glass Photo & Camera’s new location on Fifth Street next door to Photolab. Credit: Nathan Dalton

Looking Glass Photo & Camera, the shop that has been outfitting professional and amateur photographers alike for 53 years, has moved to Fifth Street in West Berkeley. This is the fourth location for Looking Glass, which was founded by Peter Pfersick on Telegraph Avenue in 1971 before moving to its longtime home on Oregon Street. Current owner, Jen Waicukauski, bought the business in 2008 and relocated to Ashby Avenue in 2013. 

The Ashby Avenue space was much larger than the new location, and was essentially a “showroom for Amazon,” according to Waicukauski, where customers would peruse the photo equipment, consult with a Looking Glass employee, and then leave to go buy gear online. 

The new smaller space will help take care of that problem, Waicukauski hopes, and it also fits better with her community-minded vision for the store.

“We don’t want to be Amazon,” she said. “We want to actually connect with people and help them achieve their creative goals. And to do that, we don’t need to have a giant warehouse space.”

Looking Glass offers photography classes both online and instore, as well as private lessons, and “full outfitting” consultations. The shop will soon be offering gear rentals, and Waicukauski plans to rent out rooms in the new space for independent photography teachers and photography groups, including a new group of women photographers that is being formed.

The new location is next door to Looking Glass’s lab partner, PhotoLab, and two photographers and a framer are also located in the building, which is located in West Berkeley, where art studios abound. 

“So we’re actually surrounded now by a photo community,” said Waicukauski.

Looking Glass Photo & Camera, 2239 Fifth Street, Berkeley. Phone: 510-548-6888. Hours: Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Connect via Instagram and Facebook.

Closing Downtown

Grabango, the checkout-free technology company, checks out

Grabango created check-out free technology for grocery stores and gas station mini-marts. Courtesy: Grabango

Grabango, the Berkeley-based startup whose mission is to “eliminate lines and save people time” has announced it is closing. The company, a competitor with Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology, was founded by Pandora co-founder Will Glaser in 2016, and had raised $73 million in venture funding according to Pitchbook. But the sum was not enough to keep the startup afloat. 

“Although the company established itself as a leader in checkout-free technology, it was not able to secure the funding it needed to continue providing service to its clients,” a spokesperson for the company said in a statement to CNBC.

Grabango had inked deals with several 7-Eleven and Circle K locations, among other outlets. And just this year Grabango announced a partnership with the massive German-based grocery store chain, ALDI, “and the launch of the retail industry’s first full-size grocery store retrofit with checkout-free technology powered by computer vision,” according to its website. 

The company, which employed around 100 people, laid off 40% of its workforce last year, according to Grocery Dive.

Grabango, 2105 Bancroft Way, Berkeley. Phone: 510-462-2571. Connect via Instagram and Facebook.