Help Sarap Shop with HQ Construction & Safety

Dearest Sarap friends and family,

The past 6 years have been fast and furious — they have filled our hearts with lots of memories, new friendships, and a ton of full tummies. And while the pandemic, like for many, has been one of the hardest chapters of the Sarap adventure, it taught us a lot about the entrepreneurship experience, and gave us clarity on where we want to take our next chapter.

We won’t sugar coat it. During the past 8 months, there were a few wild curveballs from the universe that had us reflect on whether we were going to continue. We poured all of our TLC into the 3 years of the pandemic, and while we knew the 4th year of rebuilding would require a lot, we didn’t think it’d be as wild as it was.

During our recent break, we recommitted to keeping this party going, as hard as it’s been. And while we’ve got our energy going on our recommitment to our next 5 year plan, we’ll be honest—the curveballs have continued.

The biggest and hairiest one is getting our HQ up and running, like for real for real.

Yeesssss, we’ve been talking about it since August. We’re just as meerrrrrp about the ever changing timeline as you. And in the spirit of transparency, we’ll share a bit more about what’s been causing the delays. Because who doesn’t love a little tea? And also because, we believe in what’s collectively possible when we share information + learnings as we go (read as: expensive curveballs to be on the lookout for), and it’s relieving for us to just put it all out there.

So here we go! Storytiiiiime!

1) Last summer, right before we signed our lease to our brick and mortar, a good chunk of our HQ nest egg got side swiped by a snafu with Square. They incorrectly marked our account fraudulent, froze our account, and withheld 100% of our sales for nearly 4 months. Majority of our business is conducted through Square and in a panic, we took a business loan to cover our regular operating expenses and payroll as we navigated a long, traumatizing runaround resolution process with Square’s teams. That loan had sneak-ily written terms, that we now know are methods for predatory lending especially to our communities. The repayment of that loan has been a painfully expensive lesson learned. And we bring this to attention to also raise awareness around being wary about these types of funding methods. And that even in a business crisis, it’s still worthwhile to take the time to ask additional experts to review the fine print with you.

2) After signing our lease for our brick and mortar in August 2022, we had a series of unsafe encounters with our contractor at the time. This included multiple moments when they directly mistreated one of our teammates, and also created unsafe work environments for their subcontracted team members, including one that resulted in a hospital visit. We attempted multiple times to compassionately remedy the situation, but it finally came to a point that we decided to stand up for ourselves and let the contractor go at the expense of our timeline. Upon doing so, they caused damages to our space and left work unfinished. This not only set our opening back, but also cost us additional funding for repairs and a redo of their work. We had plans to open in October in time for Filipino American History Month, but unfortunately we still had a bit of work ahead.

3) Then a big surprise curveball that was thrown at us in October was a super unfortunate one that rocked us at our core. The rental truck we used for Undiscovered got broken into right in front of our HQ. Fortunately, no one was hurt, but the value of the stolen items was high (and not yet insured T_T). We replaced what we could out of pocket, but there were also a few irreplaceable heirlooms that belonged to our good friends. Growing up in SF, we are sadly accustomed to burglary happening, but when it happens so close and with such precious items, feelings of violation are hard to overcome.

4) To top things off, the mega storms that hit SF in December through March caused us to shut down our food truck operation for the safety of our team and customers. It created even more additional costs for repairs due to significant flooding happening at both our truck and our new brick and mortar.

5) Aaaaand the latest and greatest jenga piece to be removed from our HQ plans is new construction news we just got about our roof. Because of the significant damage that we sustained from the storm, our HQ roof needs to be fully replaced further delaying our grand opening.

Life of an entrepreneur #amirite LOL

You might be wondering at this point, “OMG, why do y’all still do this?”

Well, if you cruise to our IG and see all the irreplaceable memories and community milestones we’ve had the ability to contribute to and experience with y’all, you’ll know exactly why.

But now, with the news of the roof and its related delays, we had another rerack meeting as a team and we asked ourselves, “How do we want to move things forward? Delay more or try something else?”

Ok, so this is where this GoFundMe comes in. We could keep toughing it out on our own, but we thought this round, why not try to get through this hump with the food family we’ve built?

At our current pace, we’d be looking at the Winter for a grand opening… but we’re burning out on having more delays. And we’re anxious about the big risks that come with opening in the Winter. And our hearts are ready to be for real, for real ready for a Summer grand opening with y’all.

So here we are rallying the food fam to get through this (hopefully ) last hump!

Areas of Need

Critical need 1: last pieces of HQ construction ($35k)

There are a few ongoing projects that require a bit more funding to get us to opening — finishing up repairs needed from damage + incomplete work by our former contractor (yes, some of the big ones are still lingering). The areas we’re prioritizing are for foundational safety and accessibility like updating our flooring to meet new health code, broken stairs, plumbing, repairing leak damages, weather-proofing, and updated electrical layout.

Critical need 2: equipment for health & efficiency ($30k)

Just like Little Piña, our community trailer at Kapwa Gardens, our new HQ space will be accessible for rising food entrepreneurs to prototype and test their dreams and ideas. There are a few pieces of equipment we need in order to ensure we can provide a kitchen experience that supports safe practices and self-care in an industry that is incredibly demanding on the body. This includes kitchen hood updates, upgrading to a dishwashing machine and water heater to support that increased capacity, and updating to ergonomic furnishings. We’re also investing in some security system upgrades to keep everyone and all our things safer.

Our Goal.

We set our goal to raise $65,000. We know the work listed is a bit more than this, but we still have some savings to cover the gap. Even though our timeline of opening to the public is overdue, we are optimistic that we can get it ready sooner with this last bit of funding.

Thank YOU

Finally, we want to say it again before ending this love letter: MARAMING SALAMAT (thank you so much). We recognize that today’s economy and many of our current life stages (we’re right there with all the fellow caretakers of aging parents, extended families, and babies!), every dollar counts even more than before. Words of encouragement, giggle-inducing TikToks, and hugs (virtual + IRL) are also extremely welcome and helpful.

If you’re not able to donate, we totally understand and will continue to love on you in all the ways we normally do.

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for showing up for us all of these years, for living out the spirit of kapwa* and bayanihan**. Thank you for being the heartbone of The Sarap Shop, and for being part of our chosen family. We can’t express how much you mean to us! We are so, so close and cannot wait to have you over this Summer

Team Sarap (James, JP, and Kristen

*kapwa: embracing our shared identity and to care for our fellow beings

**bayanihan: the spirit of communal unity and cooperation to achieve