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The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

theguardian.com

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Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#161

Post by pipelineist »

weinzierl wrote: post #10

Several hyper-specialist shops I know in Munich: - balloon shops seem to do really well because we have several here and every major city seems to have one - foam shop for when you need to fix your upholstery - venetian blind store which only sells the vertical kind - Ketten Wild was a chain shop that only sold chains but chains in all forms and sizes - la porcelaine blanche's slogan is "only china, only white" and t…

Schrauben Preisinger is an amazing store.

It's properly old-fashioned in appearance. A small, dark customer area, bounded by a counter staffed by grumpy men of oddly indeterminate age. Backed by rows and rows of ancient-looking wooden shelving, containing literal tons of different bolts (or any kind of threaded fastener).

I once went there because I needed a particular bolt for a 1972 Land Rover engine. Certainly not metric, but I had no idea what kind of thread and precise size it was. The clerk glanced at it, turned briskly, walked to a particular shelf, and picked up the bolt I would need. No looking, no measuring, no scratching of heads, no hesitation. He just eyeballed the bolt size and thread right there. He was correct, too.

I'd love an excuse to go there again, but I sold the Land Rover :-D

Edit: just remembered:

- a shop that sells combs. Yes. Combs.

- a shop that makes bespoke suspenders

- a shop that specialises in sausages from a particular region in Germany (which is far enough from Munich to feel entirely random)

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#162

Post by def_true_false »

rorykoehler wrote: post #60
emteycz wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because there is a pro-communist protest

You mean there is a labour day march?

The event's meaning is not the same on this side of the curtain. All but mandatory attendance (sometimes with people literally checking names off a list), officials' speeches and military parades tend to sour the mood somewhat, and, from what I can tell, that memory lingers still. These days, many people just use it as an extra day off.

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#163

Post by s_trumpet »

spectramax wrote: post #79

Hyper-specialization is everywhere if you ever step into any Asian country. Indians even have last names based on their hyper-specialized occupation. I was in Thailand and I saw a tiny shop whose only job was to take old torn notes and exchange it for a new one by charging a small flat fee. I had an Indian friend that told me that specializations in old cities was also geographically organized. One part of street wou…

The legendary Sodabottleopenerwala - possibly apocryphal.

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#164

Post by dev_north_east »

megablast wrote: post #46
arethuza wrote: post #6

For many many years there was a shop on Victoria street in Edinburgh that appeared to sell nothing but brooms and large balls of string - it was even mentioned in Complicity by Iain Banks. Here are some pics of it: http://www.edinphoto.org.uk/0_MY_P_S/0_my_photographs_shops_... Edit: Sad to say that I passed that shop for many years going to uni in the Grassmarket (both as a student and working there) and never went…

There was also a Christmas store on the royal mile. Not sure if it still exists.

Yep, still there. I picked up a nice tree ornament last month :)

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#165

Post by microtherion »

TomMarius wrote: post #153
microtherion wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May 1st is Labor Day in most of the world.

I was born in a communist country, you don't need to tell me. There was Labor day march elsewhere, as I wrote in the previous comment. This was a protest. They did not move and actually did call themselves a protest, not march (if you asked about that, they pointed you to the march that was elsewhere and also at another time later in the day).

> you don't need to tell me

All right, but I was saying so from the perspective and for the potential benefit of US readers, who celebrate Labor Day in the fall.

As for your other point, at least here in Switzerland, the delineation between "march" and "protest" is not so clear, and May Day usually features both.

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#166

Post by abrugsch »

weinzierl wrote: post #10

Several hyper-specialist shops I know in Munich: - balloon shops seem to do really well because we have several here and every major city seems to have one - foam shop for when you need to fix your upholstery - venetian blind store which only sells the vertical kind - Ketten Wild was a chain shop that only sold chains but chains in all forms and sizes - la porcelaine blanche's slogan is "only china, only white" and t…

I remember my first visit to Berlin AFTER 1989 (my first time was in the summer of 1989 and one of the things my dad wanted to do was go through checkpoint charlie and spend some time putzing about in East Berlin/Germany and I vaugeley remember noticing the difference in the crossing lights as a difference but that was probably about it...) and in sometime around '92 the little guy was EVERYWHERE. (for context to non-Germans or people who've never spent any time in Berlin/former east German cities the Ampelmann that the parent poster is referring to is the character of the crosswalk "green man walking/Red man stop" lights that was in use in the former East Germany before reunification. it was much more of a personable silhouette than the more diagramatic stick men of the west. see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ampelm%C3%A4nnchen

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#167

Post by yourapostasy »

reaperducer wrote: post #108
yonaguska wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep my old toothbrushes for cleaning various things so at least I can re-use them. Bicycle chains, baseboards, bathroom tiles, etc.

Yeah, I do that for cleaning grout. But the amount of grout to clean in my house is dwarfed by my used toothbrush supply. I wish they could at least be recycled.

There are other uses for old toothbrushes [1], but I'm with you: I want the only parts that get tossed be the bristles themselves, ideally as a soil amendment (not as plastic nanoparticles that end up inside our food chain). It is very annoying plastics are used for only a tiny fraction of their lifecycles, and spend most of their lifecycle polluting our raw resources.

Interestingly, there is a company that rebristles antique brushes and also sells toothbrushes [2]. No idea if they rebristle toothbrushes.

Blizzident [3] sells an interesting product for $340, rebristles for $90, and you have to spend up to $200 to get a dental impression because the Blizzident is custom fit to each user [4]. Verified experience seems sparse on the ground [5], [6], and actual controlled study seems non-existent.

[1] https://experthometips.com/22-uses-for-used-toothbrush

[2] https://kentbrushes.com/bodycare/handmade-toothbrushes

[3] http://www.blizzident.com

[4] https://newatlas.com/blizzident-toothbrush/29264/

[5] https://www.reddit.com/r/Dentistry/comments/aco59q/product_r...

[6] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15JlKqoU4cI

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#168

Post by weinzierl »

patall wrote: post #119
soperj wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>elk shop for everything elk related - not that we have any elks in Germany but elks are cute This sentiment right here is why more people are killed by Elk every year in Canada than bears.

This statement is actually wrong since Germany has a population of about 10-20 elk (and more are migrating from Poland). But yes, last year we also had a car crash with an elk in Brandenburg but only the animal and its unborn died.

That wouldn't have occurred to to me, but you are right. I've heard about bears and wolves, but now we have elk too.

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#169

Post by weinzierl »

pipelineist wrote: post #161
weinzierl wrote: post #10

Several hyper-specialist shops I know in Munich: - balloon shops seem to do really well because we have several here and every major city seems to have one - foam shop for when you need to fix your upholstery - venetian blind store which only sells the vertical kind - Ketten Wild was a chain shop that only sold chains but chains in all forms and sizes - la porcelaine blanche's slogan is "only china, only white" and t…

Schrauben Preisinger is an amazing store. It's properly old-fashioned in appearance. A small, dark customer area, bounded by a counter staffed by grumpy men of oddly indeterminate age. Backed by rows and rows of ancient-looking wooden shelving, containing literal tons of different bolts (or any kind of threaded fastener). I once went there because I needed a particular bolt for a 1972 Land Rover engine. Certainly not…

Your description of the store is very accurate. One thing I'd like to add that always fascinated me was their stock ledger. Long after everything was computerized here, they still had this enormous ledger resting on a kind of lectern behind the counter. Every sale was carefully entered in this book. It's a few years since I have been there for the last time so I don't know if it still exits or if they have got a computer eventually.

Re: The hyper-specialist shops of Berlin

#170

Post by c0vfefe »

teddyh wrote: post #27

I would assume that the decline of specialist shops is strongly correlated with rising rents for storefront properties. But with online shopping on the rise, maybe landlords (outside shopping malls and after some years to pass through the stages of grief) can accept that there just isn’t that much money in rents for storefronts anymore, and that specialist shops thereby can continue to exist. Of course, the risk is t…

My guess would be that the close of small shops is due more to sales lost to online shopping than the natural rise of rent costs.
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