In 2017, the noted British artist Richard Patterson wrote for D Magazine a 3,200-word essay about the importance to Dallas culture of the bar at the Whole Foods in Lakewood. The piece was titled “A Meditation on the Proper Care of Good Cheese and the Soul of Dallas.” So I don’t think I’m overreacting when I say that the removal of this bar makes me wish that Jeff Bezos would climb into his penis-shaped rocket and fly it right into the sun.
When I laid eyes on the photo you see at the top of the post, I called the store to confirm that, in fact, the bar had been ripped out and that this is a permanent situation. The helpful guy who answered the phone confirmed that the bar was taken out this week and that it is not coming back. “Oh, that is sad, sad, sad,” I said. He replied, “I agree. It’s sad.”
I didn’t ask why because it doesn’t matter. What? You think Bezos is going to change his mind? That bar must have made money. It sold beer and wine, of course, but more lucratively, it got shoppers tipsy. In my experience, that bar added 35 percent to your grocery bill. And I was happy to pay it. Why hem and haw over which cheese to buy? Two IPAs say: “Buy both!”
Thing is, I must be wrong about the revenue generated by that bar. Bezos knows more than I do. He knows more than any of us. We are his breakfast octopus. And so it goes.
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