Raleigh’s first batch of celebrity chefs has arrived.
No one would dispute that the mayor of the Flavortown that is Raleigh is Ashley Christensen, homegrown heroine and the nation’s reigning James Beard award-winner for outstanding chef.
But heavy is the head that wears the crown of Flavortown: AC put us on the map. Our secret is out, in other words.
In the next year or so, no fewer than three celebrity chefs will open new concepts in the Raleigh area. There’s Top Chef’s Katsuji Tanabe’s as-yet nameless wood-fire grill coming soon to City Market. There’s Ford Fry’s elevated Tex Mex restaurant, Superica, opening in Cary. And, Raleigh Magazine is pleased to be the first to announce, in North Raleigh, Kenny Gilbert—another Top Chef alum—will open a wood-fire grill and kitchen-slash-Southern comfort style smokehouse, Cut and Gather, in the Wakefield neighborhood by the end of the year.
“The vacancy sign went ‘on’ in Raleigh,” says Max Trujillo, a dining industry veteran, host of the NC Food & Beverage podcast and frequent Raleigh Magazine contributor. What started, he explains, with the rise of the craft beer industry in North Carolina—with Midwest and West Coast breweries New Belgium and Sierra Nevada opening production facilities in the state—has now extended to the food scene.
“This is the evolution of [what the beer industry started],” Trujillo continues. “From the outside looking in, the food industry here has evolved from being in a symbiotic relationship to other industries—tech, real estate—to being a draw on its own, the reason people come to town. We can’t fly under the radar any longer.”
Katsuji Tanabe, f8 Photo Studios
Each of the incoming celebrity chefs has their own reason as to “why Raleigh.” For Tanabe, he’s eager to get his young family out of Los Angeles.
“It’s a very douche-y city,” says the Japanese-Mexican Top Chef fan favorite, laughing, as we stroll around the perimeter of Moore Square. His restaurant will marry flavors from both cultures, but don’t call it fusion, he advises; call it dinner. The personable chef is excited to plant roots in a place where friendships happen organically and spontaneously. “You drive everywhere in LA,” Tanabe continues. “There’s no conversations. You don’t go to a bar and talk to a stranger.”
As well as offering an opportunity to escape the douchey-ness, the Triangle impressed Tanabe with its food culture—he raves about the bagels at Transfer Company’s Benchwarmer’s, about the shrimp at Local’s Seafood—and its friendliness.
“Few places in America have a real cuisine,” Tanabe says. “The Carolinas have barbecue, watermelon, shrimp, amazing fish. The Farmer’s Market felt like [the markets in] Mexico. They have all the produce just laying there and you’re talking to the guy who grows these peaches, the lady who grew these herbs.”
That sense of welcoming to a newcomer extends from folks across the local food scene, Tanabe explains.
“Lately, all the friends I’ve been making is because I go to restaurants, meet bartenders, servers, managers,” he says. “I’m from the idea to embrace each other. Safety in numbers. The more bars, restaurants you open, the better.”
Kenny Gilbert, Photo by Agnes Lopez
It’s a philosophy chefs Gilbert and Fry are likely to agree with. Unlike Tanabe, neither is personally relocating to Raleigh. But both are venturing outside of markets they’re already familiar with, and successful in, with new concepts to take a chance on the Triangle.
Gilbert, who has cooked Oprah Winfrey’s Thanksgiving dinners for the past four years and owns two restaurants in Florida, is famous for his down-home takes on everything from pizza to nachos, salads to superfoods. His menus feature barbecue and other smoked meats as well as side dishes inspired by his Florida-born mother’s southern cooking. For Raleigh, Gilbert envisions a venue that’s homey and inviting, “like walking into your Grandma’s house and getting a warm hug,” he says. Family-style dining and fellowship will be emphasized: “Being able to bring out a platter of food to share amongst loved ones, to me, is what it’s all about.”
The 46-year-old Gilbert’s lengthy resume includes maintaining a AAA Five Diamond kitchen as chef de cuisine of Salt, the Ritz-Carlton on Amelia Island’s fine dining restaurant, at just 23 years old. His successor to that position was none other than Scott Crawford, and Crawford’s success at Herons and the Umstead, and then with Crawford and Son and now Jolie, Gilbert says, factored into his decision to open Cut and Gather here.
“We’ve been friends for the last several years,” Gilbert says of Crawford. “He’s a family guy. I knew he wouldn’t be planting roots with his family if people there didn’t appreciate good food and that he’d be able to help educate them on food.”
It may be a growing local food world here in the Triangle, but it’s still a small one: as it happens, Crawford’s next concept, a steakhouse, is slated to open in the same Cary shopping center, Fenton, as Fry’s Superica.
Ford Fry, Photo by Andrew Thomas Lee
Fry, a Houston native with a restaurant empire that spans cities across the Southeast, including Atlanta, Nashville and Charlotte, says he has a mission to bring the kind of Tex-Mex he grew up eating in Houston to the region at large.
“People call it elevated Tex-Mex but I look at it as super casual,” Fry says of Superica, which has existing locations in Atlanta, Houston and Nashville. Offerings, including tortillas and salsa, are all homemade and food is cooked on a wood burning grill. “It’s got kind of an Austin, Texas vibe, with classics, and some modern Tex-Mex, margaritas.”
Fry’s draw to the area?
“I love putting restaurants in cities I really like to go,” Fry says. He travelled to the Triangle often with his son who, before leaving to play college tennis at Auburn, played in tennis tournaments around the Triangle. “This was one I thought was super cool, it had great food. Cary was a good opportunity.”
And that in itself could be the crux of it, says Trujillo; chefs, and other industry people in general, just really like Raleigh. And, dare we say it, they like it more than the larger markets where the talent is already concentrated.
“There’s the argument that, to open another restaurant in a well-established city could potentially be more difficult, more challenging, more expensive than to set up shop in a place like this,” Trujillo says. “There is more opportunity here, for a better price.” And while it may mean higher prices for diners, it will also mean higher quality food, more creativity and more variety.
“The diner wins because there are higher expectations, the bar will be set higher,” Trujillo says. “That’s not to say local chefs are any less talented but they’ll be competing more, on a larger scale. Having celebrity chefs here, with their huge social media presences, makes our area more noticed. So they’ll continue to come. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.”
She persisted, she read the room right, and, on October 8, she came out on top. Mary-Ann Baldwin will be the next mayor of Raleigh.
Baldwin bested her closest challengers, Charles Francis and Caroline Sullivan, with 38 percent of the vote, and none of this year’s City Council candidates called for November runoffs. Baldwin’s victory, along with the election of four new candidates—Patrick Buffkin in District A, Saige Martin in D, David Knight in E and Jonathan Melton at-large—who say they are open to development and ready to embrace innovative ideas, new tech and different ways of doing business, means that change lies ahead for Raleigh. And it will be steered by a council majority that includes Nicole Stewart and Corey Branch whose platforms seem largely to align with those of the newcomers.
In announcing that he would not seek a runoff against Baldwin (she didn’t meet the 50 percent threshold of votes needed to win outright), Francis said that “there was no clear mandate in the Mayor’s race for any candidate.” This may sound like sour grapes to Baldwin’s supporters but Francis is correct. He won 31 percent of the vote and Sullivan, Zainab Baloch, Justin Sutton and George Knott took around 30 percent of the vote combined.
As in 2017, precincts in east Raleigh voted overwhelmingly for Francis while precincts in the central part of the city went mostly to Baldwin. Now, she faces the same challenge as Mayor Nancy McFarlane did two years ago when McFarlane defeated Francis in a runoff election: how to unite a city whose residents are ready to embrace growth, on the one hand, but who, on the other, are being rapidly displaced by gentrification and market forces.
It’s no easy task but Baldwin is tenacious, experienced and effective. With allies on the council, she’s well-positioned to make a go of it.
The New Council
Jonathan Melton, Newly elected At-Large
Nicole Stewart, Re-elected At-Large
A look at the issues they will soon tackle.
Raleigh’s 2019 municipal election was the most expensive in the city’s history, with mayoral candidate Sullivan—who held a New York City fundraiser with special guest Hillary Clinton—raising a whopping $421,932 according to pre-election campaign finance reports. Of course all that cash didn’t translate into a victory. And while in most of the other races the top fundraisers received the most votes, it seems that in Raleigh, still, you can’t just go out and buy an election…at least not yet.
But as the city’s profile grows, money is likely to talk even louder. Out-of-town, out-of-state and other special interests are likely to intervene even more aggressively, and future candidates are likely to become even more sophisticated with their campaign strategies. If anything good comes out of that, hopefully, it will mean more voters—because it was another abysmal year for voter turnout, especially among young people (ironic, given the relative youth of the new council). According to data from the Wake County Board of Elections, 54,969 voters cast ballots in Districts A-E. Their average age? 54. Turns out it wasn’t the young folks that put these new council members in their seats. It was older voters, as in elections past; this year, though, they decided they’re ready for change.
Without further ado, here’s our analysis of what changes we’re likely to see in Raleigh in the short and long term under the new council, based on the platforms laid out on the winning candidates’ websites and their responses to a Raleigh Magazinequestionnaire sent out before the election.
David Cox, Re-elected District B
Affordable housing
Many of the newly elected candidates identified a lack of affordable housing as the most pressing issue facing Raleigh. In the short term, expect to see a vote to make ADUs, or backyard cottages, allowed to be built by right, a policy some candidates point to as being a missing piece to the affordable housing puzzle. We’ll likely also see an affordable housing bond on the ballot next year as the majority of candidates say they support a “well-crafted” bond proposal and a presidential election year bodes well for its passage. City staff already recommended a bond in the neighborhood of $100 million; Councilman Branch prefers $120 million. Bond revenue could help pay for candidates’ ambitious ideas to address affordable housing in the long term, including public-private partnership projects to build affordable units and banking land along transit corridors. Speaking of transit corridors, voting to up-zone along them could result in new affordable housing projects coming to fruition rather quickly. And, speaking of up-zoning, loosening minimum lot size and minimum parking allotment rules, coupled with encouraging construction of missing middle housing (think condos, duplexes, triplexes, quads and townhouses) in residential areas could make a perceptible difference in the years to come.
Patrick Buffkin, Newly elected District A
Scooters and Airbnb
Most members of the new council say they feel the regulations around electric scooters were too stringent. If the Gotcha scooters permitted to operate around Raleigh don’t work out as planned, we can likely expect to welcome Bird and Lime scooters back on to our streets (and, let’s face it, sidewalks) once again, with lower operating fees and fewer restrictions. On short-term rentals, expect the council to revisit the current regulations STAT. Most new members say they think the rules banning whole house rentals are too strict.
Corey Branch, Re-elected District C
Police Oversight
There’s no consensus on this issue. A police oversight board with subpoena powers is currently illegal under state law. While we don’t see this council uniting in an effort to petition the General Assembly to change the rule, several of the newly elected members—including Melton, Martin and Knight as well as incumbent Branch—say they support some kind of police oversight/investigatory board, whether it’s a “police accountability review board” (Martin) or “civil service board” (Branch). Baldwin, Buffkin and Stewart didn’t make police oversight central to their campaigns but the council as a whole is likely to face continued public pressure to act around the issue. There are community dialogue sessions happening later this year to hear from residents about police oversight; activists say they’re ready for the council to take action and quit stalling.
Saige Martin, Newly elected District D
Soccer in Southeast Raleigh
The newly elected majority members are all on record supporting building a soccer stadium in southeast Raleigh, though they diverge on whether to use public money—some $13 million a year—that’s specially allocated for tourism-generating projects to help finance the project. If a vote comes before the council—the city and county are currently studying a stadium’s feasibility—there might be some infighting. Due to mounting fears around gentrification, taxpayers on both sides of the issue will surely be vocal.
Letting Staff Alone
David Knight, Newly elected District E
This is a majority that, to a member, says it perceives city staffers and managers to be doing a good job running Raleigh. If the council members can come together on a clear policy direction for growth—and we have plenty of reasons to think that they can—expect them to step back and let staffers have a heavy hand in guiding decision-making. In real terms, this means we can expect issues to get resolved with urgency rather than to languish in council committees subject to review and endless study.
The Day of the Dead is an annual, three-day celebration of life and death that’s observed in communities across Mexico and Latin America. We spoke with Rafael Osuba, a Raleigh-based artist and founder of the El Quixote festival, about Día de los Muertos’ origins and customs.
How did Day of the Dead begin and where is it celebrated?
Day of the Dead is most popular in Mexican cultures, but it’s not exclusive to Mexico. It has been traced back to Mesoamerica and has been around for centuries in different Latin American countries.
How do communities observe Day of the Dead?
Every country celebrates a little bit differently. Guatemalans, for instance, make huge kites, about 40 feet tall, and fly them around. That’s their way of making the connection from the natural world to those who have passed on. In some areas of Mexico, people walk to cemeteries with luminaries. There, they will dress and decorate their loved ones’ [graves] with marigolds, bright colors and scents. Or they decorate an altar.
What do the altars signify?
There’s usually three different elements to the altar, a ground, middle and top that represent different stages of life. There is usuallypapel picado, thin, colorful tissue paper that represents the wind blowing as someone walks by. The elements, fire, wind and ground, are very important. And there are different things people add to an altar, foods—the traditional bread, pan de muertos—or alcohol. It’s believed that on this special day, the dead would walk among us, so it’s a way for them to have a drink and celebrate, a nice thought. Usually, there’s a photograph to identify the individual being commemorated and candles to draw attention to the altar and signify life.
How do people dress for Day of the Dead?
People want to look their best so they put on their nicest traditional dress as a form of respect. So you’ll see a lot of traditional dress, with bright colors. In some areas of Mexico, folks will paint their faces in the skull shape. Not everywhere. It’s not Halloween, it’s not dressing up as a character. But sometimes, ladies will dress up in a way to represent La Catrina [a goddess that represents the Day of the Dead].
This is the third year the El Quixote Festival has celebrated Day of the Dead at the City of Raleigh Museum. What can attendees expect?
Two visual artists will be creating the altar and we encourage members of the community to come in traditional dress and bring ofrenda to add to the altar. People bring photos of their loved ones who have passed on. Come share hot chocolate, try some traditional bread. We always have live music and a craft table to make marigolds to take home or add to the altar. It’s bilingual and a fun, family friendly event, a way to come and remember and commemorate our ancestors and loved ones.
El Quixote is a statewide, traveling arts festival that runs from September to April each year and celebrates the spirit of Miguel de Cervantes’ “Don Quixote” and other works, artists and figures from history through various programming. The City of Raleigh Museum’s Day of the Dead event takes place from 6-9 p.m. as part of First Friday. No registration is required. Learn more at iamquixote.com/service/day-of-the-dead-city-of-raleigh-museum
As much as we worry about it, spend hours each week devoted to acquiring it, plan for it and inevitably part with it, money is still a relatively taboo topic. We don’t typically talk with our friends, neighbors, even co-workers about how much we make, what we spend it on specifically, or how much debt we have—because we just don’t think it’s polite.
But maybe things shouldn’t be this way.
As we chug along into the season of spending—on food, on gifts, on charity—and assess our budgets going into the new year, we wanted to have some forthright conversations about cash. In some ways, money’s the great unifier—we all need it—and if we all want more of it, well, we shouldn’t be afraid to talk about it. Also, we’re nosy.
So, here’s a look at what some real Raleighites, at different stages of their lives, in different living and career situations, spend over the course of five days. It’s a lot of takeout and drinks and coffee, but it’s also mortgages, travel costs and payments to credit card debt and student loans. And, um, five adult-size Santa suits from walmart.com (we’re not here to judge!).
We hope these diaries make you see that, whether you love or hate the almighty dollar, it really is OK to talk about it. Starting a dialogue can help you budget, help you to save or even help you to recognize that you deserve that raise. See how your spending stacks up.
Designer, 33 + Designer, 26
We’ll call our first diarist Cathy*, a 33-year-old senior designer at a large public IT firm in town. Cathy lives in a house in the South Park neighborhood with her fiancé, Sam, 26, also a designer and they make a combined salary of $196,000 a year. They have $120,000 in savings, pay $1,250 per month to their mortgage, $97.88 for electricity, $49.99 for cable and internet, $31.45 for gas, $58.50 for water and trash and $20 monthly for a security system. They have no student loan debt and pay off their credit cards each month but they do have a $301.06 car payment and pay $67.39 for insurance. Their phone bill comes to $80 month, they have a $32 gym membership, pay $41 for Netflix, Hulu and HBO, $15 for Pandora and Spotify monthly plus $76 to the Produce Project and Compost Now and $11 for Piquant Post, a meal delivery service. Here’s Cathy’s money diary.
Thursday
At 9:49 a.m., we got an email notification that there was a price drop on one of the houses on our wish list. We were casually talking to a realtor to find out how much we could sell for and what it would cost to buy something bigger than our 800 square-foot house and also looking for contractor quotes to make some improvements to make the small space more usable. We weren’t necessarily ready to buy but we had to go see this beautiful three-bedroom, 1,900 square-foot house in our same neighborhood. We made an appointment for 5 p.m. and spent our lunch break contacting mortgage brokers and eating leftover Chinese takeout. Following a work team happy hour at The Pit (ordered a half pint for $6.33) we ran to make our appointment. We both fell in love with the house and spent the rest of the night stressing about if we were actually ready to buy. In all the craziness we forgot to make dinner and spent $24.84 on takeout pizza from Frank’s on New Bern.
Friday
We went to Reuben’s NY Deli for lunch and got two gigantic and delicious sandwiches, spending $26, plus $9 on a beer at Burial for a working meeting during which we decided to officially put in an offer on the house. That night, friends from college visited and stayed with other friends nearby, because of our current lack of space. We took a Lyft for $8.75 to meet them at Bida Manda. We went a little overboard ordering family style to show off to our friends; each couple spent $102. Then we had one drink each at Brewery Bhavana and Watts & Ward. Those charges aren’t on our credit card bill so I guess my friends got those, thanks guys!
Saturday
We picked up breakfast supplies totaling $39, including a dozen Biscuitville biscuits, and drove to our friends’ house to cook. Then we drove to Durham where we stopped at Bulldega, the Farmers Market, Boxcar, Bull City Mini and Bull City Ciderworks. We spent around $100 total, which included picking up the tab a few times for the group. At Ciderworks, we got a call from our realtor that the seller was still considering the offer we made. We quickly did the math for what it would take for us to go up to the asking price and decided to go for it. Shortly after, we heard back that our offer was accepted! After a mini-celebration/panic, everyone crammed into our house to play Mario Party and rest before heading to the Bluegrass Festival. We couldn’t handle fried food so we went to Weaver Street Market for dinner, spending $11. Then we went back to the festival to get Two Roosters ice cream for $4.
Sunday
We went to brunch at Clouds Brewing with friends. Clouds was one of the handpicked offers in our Offline Premium subscription, a service in Raleigh and Durham that helps you explore new places. Four of us used our Offline Premium deals and we split the remaining balance two ways, which came to $52 for our half. Then we stopped at Heirloom Brewshop to get a $5 cold brew before saying goodbye to our visiting friends. The most exciting part of the day was going to our new house and handing off the due diligence check of $1,000. We spent the rest of the day signing paperwork, researching insurance companies, and starting a Goodwill box.
Monday
We worked from home today which allowed me to snag a dehydrator from Nextdoor for $30. After work, we started on our “oh crap, now we have to get our house in a sellable state” list by going to Home Depot and Target, spending $117. We also spent $68 at PetSmart to get extra litter boxes that our 11 year-old tabby will need in our future, larger home and, of course, a treat for the dog to be fair. Laziness then set in. We got Chick-fil-A for dinner using a gift card from a Red Cross blood drive and $6.97 cash.
Total spent: $1,419.89
Marketing Specialist, 40+
Our next diarist, Tom, is a 40-plus marketing specialist who makes around $75,000 a year, is single and lives alone. Tom pays $1,200 towards the mortgage on his North Hills home. Electricity costs him $40-100 per month depending on the season, cable and internet tops out at $145 per month and he pays $25 for gas, $60 for water, $100 for his phone and $100 per month for a housecleaning service. Tom has no debt and no car payment; he pays $900 per year for car insurance, $160 per month for a gym membership, $119 a year for Netflix and Amazon and $200 per month for doggie day care, which he uses twice a week for his lab. Here’s Tom’s money diary.
Wednesday
I had all-day work meetings so it was a fast lunch: takeout at Chipotle and an afternoon pick-me-up at Starbucks. On the way home, I filled up my tank at Costco for $40 and got Thai to go at Thai House by the Aldi on Wake Forest Road for $28 (I got two orders, who doesn’t love microwaving leftovers!). Total spent: $88, all on credit as I rarely use cash.
Thursday
DOH! My home office computer suddenly died after 5-plus good years (damn PCs, but I’m just NOT a Mac fan). So I spent the afternoon driving around to Best Buys to see which one had a good replacement in stock. I bought a new HP “loaded” laptop for $900 plus tax plus spent another $149 for Microsoft Office for Home suite. I learned the hard way not to scratch too hard to reveal the hidden activation code as I inadvertently scrubbed it illegible and spent an hour on phone with Microsoft support in India trying to get them to believe me/reactivate with a new code. I skipped lunch and ate leftovers for dinner. Total spent: about $1,100.
Friday
I ate breakfast at home then had another day of meetings in RTP but was craving sweet potato fries so I ate lunch at B Good—$11.91—then had Chido Taco for $12 to go after work. Total spent: $24, all on my credit card (love my frequent flier points!).
Saturday
It was a chill weekend. I went to the gym (O2) and did upper body work, then took a yoga class right after. Then I went home and mowed the lawn and did yard work before my neighbors complain to the City about weeds. Then, I took my friend out for their birthday to Red Dragon and spent $60 on dinner. We saw “Downton Abbey” at the Regal North Hills. I’m a big fan of the series, and anything BBC, so it was great to see the cast back in action, even if—spoiler alert—it was a little far-fetched in that they tried to oust the king and queen’s own serving people. Tickets cost $28. Then, we went to Ben and Jerry’s in North Hills for ice cream. I had a waffle cone of their “The Tonight Dough” flavor as, duh, it has two kinds of cookie dough inside and it cost $20. Total: $110, including tips.
Sunday
I had stayed up late watching the Florida vs. LSU football game and then the sports news recaps after—it was a battle of the undefeated going into the game. So I slept in late on this rainy Sunday. I only ventured out to get Starbucks coffee and a breakfast sandwich and I did a grocery run at Lidl ($40). I binge-watched Netflix the rest of the day—Battlestar Galactica—I’m a diehard sci-fi fan, so I love the special effects. Then, I meal prepped for the week’s breakfast—my usual concoction of raw oatmeal, fruits, bananas and almond milk, the perfect healthy breakfast. It forces me to eat healthy in mornings. I got a CAVA salad to-go for dinner at the new Midtown East shopping center despite the nightmare that is parking there right now with the Wegmans “newness.” Total spent: $65.
Total spent: $1,386.91
Sales, mid-40s + IT, mid-40s + middle-schooler
Anna, our third diarist, is a married mom to a middle-schooler who lives in a house near North Hills with her family, dog and three cats. Anna and her husband, Mike, are in their mid-late 40s; she works in sales, he works in IT. They have a monthly mortgage payment of $2,184, a monthly car payment of $745.70 and pay $721 per month toward health insurance. The family’s electricity, gas and water bills vary but usually come in around $200 a month. Anna has an $85 monthly gym membership, pays $153 per month for three phone services (an elderly parent is on her family’s plan) and $78.61 per month for Netflix, Hulu and Youtube TV. The family also pays $105 per month for a storage unit for the parent and there’s a recurring monthly payment of $124.50 for a new washer and dryer. They save around $500 per month, contribute $448.80 per month to a 401K and pay around $2,000 monthly on their credit cards.
Friday
It was a busy day working from home so I saved myself an hour and ordered groceries via Instacart and Aldi—$52.06. My husband bought lunch at Jersey Mike’s for $7.70. I also paid $23.04 for gas—I was in a hurry so I didn’t fill up. We throw an annual Santa party where an amazing Santa comes to our house and delights the kids. After nine years, these littles have become middle-schoolers so we decided to change it up to keep them on their toes. Five Santa suits from walmart.com cost $128.45. Good luck figuring out who the real Santa is!
Saturday
My husband took the child to Lowe’s Home Improvement Center. Child was repaid with lunch at the hotdog cart outside. Lumber: $34. Hotdogs: $9.65. Child owed me for forgetting to turn in a school assignment so I had him wash my car—saved $20! I dragged Child and Husband to see an exhibit at CAM: $0! But parking in the Dillon deck downtown cost $4. We had a quick drink and bites at Barcelona across the street: $54. Husband was not thrilled with spending $54 on a (albeit lovely) snack. I got a token for a complimentary small plate on our next visit after leaving a (positive) comment card with a manager. Then, we headed for a proper dinner at Transfer Co. Food Hall- tofu Bulgogi, steak tacos, beer, wine, Cheerwine, cookie: $69.09.
Sunday
I had promised to take brunch to a friend with a new baby. Decided to make it easy on myself and pick up ready-made items. This was great on the one hand but outrageously expensive on the other—$7 for a pile of scrambled eggs? $14 for a meager fruit salad?? Lesson learned. Wegman’s breakfast —$75.65. Had told Child I ordered this last week (but actually had forgot) so I quickly ordered an Amazon Halloween costume: $29. I had heard about an upcoming dinner at Artspace. Got the invitation and bought two tickets for $129.13. And paid $16.08 to iTunes.
Monday
Husband emailed me about the City of Raleigh Museum Dark Walking Tour of downtown Raleigh for the week of Halloween. Promptly purchased 2 tickets for $54.56. Hubs’ lunch in Durham at Fosters Market cost $5.38. I stopped in Harris Teeter to shop for basics and dinner: $52.55. I stopped into the Seaboard Wine Shop to pick up a nice bottle of wine to cap off a Monday: $15.
Tuesday
Husband put $33 gas in his tank. I had to run into Zest for a meeting. I usually leave my wallet in the car on purpose but they had some special candles I bought last year that I wanted again for the holidays. $97.22 in candles, flamingo napkins, velvet pumpkins and an ostrich notepad later, I had everything I “needed.” (You try to resist the cuteness at Zest!) Additionally, I went by Vermillion in North Hills two days back-to-back for work. I had scoped out a sweater the first day, thought about it overnight, then purchased it on the next visit: $190.91. Running around town like crazy with a new employee, we decided to take a much-needed break for lunch at Brewery Bhavana: $34.79. Parking downtown cost $1.50. At the end of the day, took Child to Ben & Jerry’s since he has been so wonderful and thoughtful – $6.63. I opted for Starbucks – $4.71
Total spent: $1,128.10
Marketing Associate, 26
Finally, Rachel, our fourth diarist, is a 26-year-old marketing associate in the healthcare field. She lives with two roommates in Westover where she pays $460 a month for rent, $40 for electricity, $20 for cable and internet, $25 for water and around $3 monthly for gas. Rachel has $4,000 in credit card debt and $30,000 in student loans. She pays $150 a month for her car, $200 for car insurance, $60 a month for her phone and $10 for TV services. Here is Rachel’s money diary.
Friday
I had packed the night before for a wedding, worked late and came into work a little after 9 a.m. I didn’t have time to make coffee or breakfast. I went to grab some at the cafe at work with a coworker since it’s BOGO pastry day on Fridays. I bought two items for $4.75. At lunch I had a pesto chicken panini at Jazmin’s for $7.03 and I bought some traveling toiletries, jewelry and a wedding card at Target: $34.29. I was traveling to the mountains and stopped at Panera to get dinner halfway there for $10.55. Total Spent: $56.62.
Saturday
I stayed at an Airbnb with 13 people the night of the wedding. Only six of us were there in the morning so we went into Blowing Rock to grab brunch. I had an omelet with hash browns and coffee at a cute diner for $16. Then we headed to Food Lion to buy snacks and more wine and beer since we drank everything we had brought the night before. I also got cash to tip the bartenders since the wedding was an open bar. I spent $21.89 on rosé, prosecco, bananas and popcorn. Then I got another $20 out in cash but I didn’t actually end up using all the cash. My credit card payment posted that day, too, $250. Total Spent $292.89.
Sunday
We made breakfast and decided to do lunch with everyone on the way back to Raleigh. We stopped at a pub in Hickory and I bought a burger and fries for $10.63, with tip. I wanted some coffee for the road so I went around the corner to a cute little coffee shop, got a latte for $3.74. I split gas with my friend and paid him $10; we had to refuel from Durham to Raleigh again, which cost $20. Total spent: $44.37.
Monday
I usually get to work around 9 and make my own breakfast if I have time. If I don’t, I tend to hop over to the cafeteria to grab a muffin, bagel or breakfast sandwich and coffee. The company cafeteria’s coffee shop has Starbucks coffee and it’s cheaper than the regular store drinks. I always use either my debit card or credit card for purchases. If I didn’t make lunch, which is often—because I’ve been so busy with work and too mentally tired when I get home to do more work—I buy either a sandwich, salad or combo from the cafeteria. Average prices range from $4 for a personal flatbread, $5.25 for a panini or $6.15 to $9.20 for a combo type of meal. Total Spent $8.43.
Tuesday
I made food but didn’t bring it. I had had it for dinner and didn’t want to eat the same thing again. I was prepping for a big event on Thursday so there was no time to really eat except for something quick so I had a turkey pesto panini. Total Spent: $6.55.
Tony Cope was shopping with his family at an Apex Target store in 2010. A gunman came in and fatally shot a cashier while Cope hid with his then 6-year-old daughter. Cope’s wife, Susan, and their older daughter fled the store along with dozens of other panicked shoppers.
It wouldn’t be the Raleigh family’s last brush with gun violence.
In 2016, Cope’s older daughter texted him while hiding from a man brandishing a gun who had shown up at a friend’s house where she was hanging out. “She was too afraid to talk [on the phone],” Cope says. “She was texting us because she was hiding in a bathroom closet.”
In both instances, Cope and his family members were physically unharmed. But the traumatic impacts have stayed with them. “My whole family are survivors, we all had to go through this,” Cope says. “It took several years to get my girl to a point where she was solid again. All of us had to live through it.”
Last month, more than 170 Raleigh businesses—including creative services agency Myriad Media, which Cope founded and leads, Trophy Brewing, Citrix, YMCA of the Triangle and York Properties—took a stand against gun violence.
The businesses’ names appeared on a poster hung up in street-front windows around town. A fundraiser at Trophy on Maywood raised around $5,000 for the North Carolina chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense; Trophy released a Czech Pilsner, Unchecked, to raise money for Moms Demand Action and, equally as important, community awareness. Local chocolate factory Videri donated a dollar from sales of their chocolate bars to raise money, too.
Trophy Brewing’s Czech Pilsner, Unchecked
“The idea was to get Raleigh businesses to sign on against gun violence, which they really have never done before,” says David Meeker, the co-owner of Trophy Brewing and Carpenter Development Group, another business that participated. “When businesses get involved, it makes it a mainstream issue. It could turn the tide. If big companies push politicians to do something, maybe they will actually pass a [gun control] bill. The big idea is to get names on a poster, make it really easy for businesses to sign on.”
In North Carolina and nationwide, gun safety organizations including Moms Demand Action and others are pushing for measures gun control advocates believe will reduce incidents of gun violence and mass shootings. These measures include expanded background checks on the federal level and Extreme Risk Protection Order laws, also known as “red flag laws,” where police and family members can petition state courts to evaluate people at risk of harming themselves or others and potentially order them to surrender their firearms. A bipartisan background check bill has long been awaiting a hearing in the U.S. Senate; in North Carolina, gun safety bills with ERPO provisions are under review in legislative committees.
“Nationally, 97 percent of American voters want a more comprehensive background checks bill,” says Madhavi Krevat, a spokesperson for the North Carolina chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense. “A majority of Republicans want it, a majority of gun owners want it. So we are very grateful to the businesses who have signed on to make their voices heard and let lawmakers know we want these common sense gun regulations passed.”
Myriad’s Cope says, aside from the fundraising, he’s most pleased to see the coalition-building spreading to other areas where activists want to take a similar approach. “There’s a Chapel Hill Against Gun Violence event this spring and we’re in coversations with four or five other states who want this approach,” Cope says. “That is everything.”
