El Faro’s Owner Wants to Sell the Business After Three Break-Ins in a Week

The hits just kept coming for El Faro, with three burglaries occurring in a little over a week, and now owner Raymunda Ramirez tells Mission Local that she’s selling off her Folsom Street business. Ramirez, 64, was an employee of the taqueria for 20 years before leading the business as owner for the last 25 years, but now it looks like she’s done. “I don’t want to sell it after all this time,” Ramirez says, “but it’s difficult living with the constant thought if someone is gonna do it again.”

The first two burglaries happened over the first weekend of October and cost Ramirez $20,000 in loss and damages, leading the business to start a GoFundMe to cover the costs. By Sunday, October 13, the business had been broken into a third time; thankfully, a sympathetic glass company owner dropped in to cover some of the costs to fix the broken windows after hearing Ramirez’s story on Univision 14 this week, Mission Local reports. Ramirez told the news outlet that her decision to sell is final and that she’ll look for new El Faro owners over the next year or so.

The Good Hop sold to new (but familiar) owners

The sale of a business doesn’t always have to spell tragedy if the right owner is found. As the sale of the Good Hop Bar & Bottle Shop in Oakland proves, a good thing can still live on. East Bay Nosh reports that the beer-centric bar has changed ownership, and Good Hop bartender Adam Clark and his partner Monica White (a Good Hop regular) have emerged as the newest stewards of the business. Original owner Melissa Myers opened the business in 2014, but after 10 years (that included a pandemic, business pivots, and more), they were ready to move on if someone could continue to support the special community that surrounds the bar and shop. Clark and White officially took over the business on Tuesday, October 1, and the couple will celebrate with a party cheekily dubbed “The Good Hop: Volume 2” on Saturday, October 19, from 2 p.m. to close.

Shake Shack continues its San Jose takeover

It seems the Shake Shack limit in San Jose doesn’t exist, as the national burger chain opens its third location on Thursday, October 17, at Westgate Center on Saratoga Avenue, Mercury News reports. This is all in addition to an upcoming fourth San Jose location slated for Bascom Avenue at the end of the year, and follows a recent spate of California Shake Shack closures in August that impacted the Oakland location and some Southern California shops.

Abaca x Kuya Lord dinner

If you’re a Bay Area local who’s wanted to try out food by chef Lord Maynard Llera — who won the 2024 James Beard Award for Best Chef: California — but just haven’t made your way to his Los Angeles-based restaurant Kuya Lord just yet, you’re in luck. Llera is in town for a one-night-only collaborative dinner with chef Francis Ang of Abaca, to be held on Monday, October 21. The four-course dinner ($129) will feature takes on Filipino dishes, such as the laing vol au vent made with taro leaves and trout roe in a puff pastry, and a seafood-based kare kare. Tickets are available via OpenTable.