Art Coppola, CEO of Macerich Co., the Santa Monica-based property development company that owns the Village at Corte Madera mall on the east side of Highway 101, kicks of the series of talks. 

From Toys "R" Us and Gymboree to Macy's and Sears, there are no shortage of examples of the downward spiral of traditional retail that some media outlets have dubbed a "retail apocalypse."

Behind $39 million of funding from venture capital firms and some of those traditional retailers searching for retail's next chapter, b8ta, a Palo Alto-based company founded in late 2015, has stepped into the void. B8ta operates a nationwide network of tech-centric stores – think Sharper Image for the modern age – that borrow some of the minimalist look and feel of Apple stores.

But instead of relying of the traditional retail business model, b8ta inks contracts with product manufacturers big and small to showcase those, this generating revenue regardless of where the customer ends up buying the products. B8ta co-founder and CEO Vibhu Norby calls it "retail as a service," allowing brands to use b8ta’s software to manage checkout, point of sale, inventory management, staff scheduling and more.

"We believe that this approach is what's going to save physical retail, which is built around the old model of retail that requires the customer to just buy from you," Norby sais. "The reality is that today when people go into stores, they're in research and learning mode – and a lot of the purchases are happening somewhere else."

B8ta has a network of 11 standalone stores as well as 70 smaller shops within Lowe's around the U.S., all designed to allow customers to test and try products. The network of shops includes a store that opened in the Village at Corte Madera in 2017. That location, operated by general manager Jonathan Burns, is launching a "Founders Series" of talks designed to "connect with the leaders of companies that are pioneering innovative products and new tech worldwide."

The series kicks off Tuesday, Oct. 16 with Art Coppola, the CEO of Macerich, the Santa Monica-based property development  company that owns the Village at Corte Madera mall on the east side of Hwy. 101. Norby will lead the conversation. Coppola will discuss "his journey in the world of retail and where he sees the industry going" in a "casual evening of networking and discussion, complete with drinks and snacks."

Coppola, Macerich's CEO for more than 20 years, is a long-standing member of the International Council of Shopping Centers and a current member of The National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts (NAREIT). In 2009, Coppola garnered NAREIT's Leader in the Light award, recognizing his significant and lasting contributions to the industry.

The 411: B8ta Corte Madera launches its Founders Series on Tuesday, Oct. 16, 6:30-9pm, with b8ta CEO Vibhu Norby leading a conversation with Macerich CEO Art Coppola at b8ta's store at the Village at Corte Madera. Free.

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On October 1, the nearly 4,500-square-foot space at 250 East Blithedale Ave. won’t house a printing shop for the first time in nearly 35 years. 

Mill Valley Services, the print shop owned by Lagunitas resident Dave Semling for the past 25 years, and the Mill Valley Chamber of Commerce’s Business of the Year in 1998 – is shutting down on Tuesday, September 30. The space was home to Mill Valley Printing for nearly a decade before Semling bought it after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.

“It was a business that was just too far under water,” Semling says of the reason to shut down. “We’ve had an unbelievably great run here for the first 20 years. We have been so fortunate here in this community – we’ve worked with some of the greatest people you could possibly wish for.”

The property at the corner of East Blithedale and Sycamore avenues, which also includes Tony Tutto Pizza and a warehouse leased by SummerHouse, was sold in 2013 to San Francisco-based Worldco Company, a real estate firm run by Tony and Alvin Chan. Through MacCracken Architects, the new owners have proposed to redevelop the property, demolishing the 1,000-square-foot building that houses Tony Tutto Pizza and remodeling the 9,300-square-foot structure that contains Mill Valley Services and the SummerHouse space. 

The Planning Commission held study sessions on the proposal in November 2013 and again in March 2014. It is expected to hold a public hearing on the proposal in the coming months.

Semling says Mill Valley Services had been struggling financially for many years, first with the economic recession that began in 2008, which saw his business dip by at least 25 percent.

And then the rapid pace at which the printing business has been changing over the past decade made it difficult to take advantage of the economic recovery that followed, Semling says. He says he spent more than $1 million on digital printing equipment over the past five years, taking out lines of credit and using credit cards in the hopes that the business could survive. "But we just kept losing money," he says.

The industry’s technological changes have made it such that a business like his could buy the latest innovative printing equipment and see it become nearly obsolete just a few years later.

Couple that with national Internet-based competitors who can easily compete on price with local and regional independent businesses like his, and Semling says he was looking at a Sisyphean task.

He’s spent the past few weeks readying the transition, helping his nine employees figure out their next steps and having digital files transferred to Strahm Communications in San Rafael, a larger outfit that has already brought on one Semling’s employees.

“The printing businesses that are becoming something to everybody – those are the ones that will survive,” Semling says.

In addition to smoothing the transition as much as possible for employees and his longtime clients, the 75-year-old Semling has been planning for the next chapter of life with his wife Janet. They have to sell their home in Lagunitas in order to pay for their retirement.

“We have less objects around us, but our family is very close, so we’ll be fine,” Semling says, noting that two of his three daughters live in the area.

Ever-evolving business an the heart of Tam Junction begins celebration with an art show on Saturday in San Francisco and a series of local anniversary events on the way.


Proof Lab, the surf and skate shop that has grown into the multi-faceted community epicenter of Tam Junction and is celebrating its 10-year anniversary with an art show in San Francisco Saturday and a series of events this fall, came from decidedly humble beginnings.

Mill Valley native Nate McCarthy and San Anselmo native Will Hutchinson, friends who’d met while working at Marin Surf Sports in Tam Junction, decided to open their own surf shop in a tiny 600-square-foot space in the small Poplar Plaza shopping center near the 7-Eleven on Shoreline Highway. The pair had driven a truck to southern California, bought as much surfing equipment and apparel that they could afford, and filled the tiny shop to the brim (see photos above).

Ten years on, the Mill Valley residents have built a mini-empire whose scale is overshadowed only by its variety and its clear vision for how to build community. Across 15,000 square feet at the corner of Shoreline Hwy. and Almonte Blvd., Proof Lab and its partners and subtenants have taken what was once a tiny surf shop and turned it into a hub that includes the Proof Lab surf and skate shop, the Proof Lab Station outdoor apparel shop, an indoor skate park, the Mill Valley Potter’s Studio, music lessons, a biodiesel station, the Little Art Studio and the CNL Native Plant Nursery, not to mention Equator Coffees at Proof Lab, whose arrival in 2013 made the space even more of a gathering spot.

“There was a lot of interest and motivation to make something good and different (in 2004), but the definition of that has changed over time as our intentions and our understanding of the world has changed – it’s been a process,” Hutchinson says.

“It’s all been about the same thing – great retail, building community, and connecting people with the arts and outdoors – but that has gone in a lot of different directions depending on what we’ve gotten into and what space has become available,” he adds.

Proof Lab’s biggest leap came in 2011. Although their business was growing at a healthily steady clip, the longstanding availability of a 10,000-square-foot warehouse that had previously been occupied by Webster Gears became enticing.

“It was a huge risk,” Hutchinson says. “The idea had been to take a leap and absorb some more space and hope the business catches up to that and then exceeds it. But this was a huge move – it was a re-invention.”

That changed everything.

It allowed Proof Lab to move the traditional surf and skate shop into the new space and add the skate park, rooms for music lessons and significantly more storage for inventory. And it allowed to put what is now Proof Lab Station – and outdoor apparel shop that features brands like Patagonia, Filson and Pendleton – in the former gas station space right on Shoreline.

Soon thereafter, the pair leased another 3,000 square feet in a partnership with the dog kennel and grooming business AlphaDog. Launching with a pumpkin patch around Halloween 2011, the venture became the GROW Art & Garden Center, testing a variety of community-oriented ideas. They eventually coalesced into three independent subtenants – Mill Valley Potter’s Studio, Little Art Studio and the CNL Native Plant Nursery.

Two years later, with Equator Coffees & Teas looking to expand their well-established wholesale business with some retail cafes, co-owner Helen Russell and Hutchinson connected on the long-vacant space on the streetfront side of the property. Equator has taken Proof Lab’s distinct sense of community to another level, Hutchinson says.

"Our partnership with Proof Lab has exceeded our expectations - Will and Nate have built a very special business that focuses on the local community, our shared values of making an impact and connection has made for a very special collaboration," Russell says.

The ability of McCarthy and Hutchinson to evolve their business, and their moves over the past three years in particular, have drawn rave reviews, including from both their landlord and their subtenants.

“I love them both to death,” says George Kim, whose family owns the entire property that includes Proof Lab and its partners and subtenants, about McCarthy and Hutchinson. “I love the way they approach business. They’re very community oriented – just great guys. And every year it seems there’s something new that they want to do – it’s a great story.”

For the latest new thing, Proof Lab has looked beyond their space in Tam Junction, building an outdoor public skate park in Marin City. They're in the midst of a Kickstarter campaign to pay for it, with Proof Lab matching its $5,000 goal. "It could be a really good thing for Southern Marin as we don't have a good public skate park right now," Hutchinson says. 

Jhaya Warmington, an artist and art teacher, met Hutchinson and McCarthy through friends, and jumped at the chance to open Little Art Studio for children as young as 18 months.

“It was a wonderful opportunity,” Warmington says. “To be able to an art program like this in the community when rents are so high is really difficult. But they’ve been so supportive, and they’ve really been mentors for those of us who’ve started these businesses but didn’t understand how to run a business in the beginning.”

For Hutchinson, there was never a blueprint for what the brand and the property would become. Instincts and a bit of serendipity have certainly helped.

“Our interests and our thinking has changed over time,” he says. “When we started all this, we weren’t thinking about biodiesel and ceramics and music lessons and coffee. But none of it’s a surprise either. It all makes sense now and it all feels right.”

The 411: On Saturday, Sept. 27 at 6pm, Proof Lab kicks off its 10-year Anniversary Celebration with a 'Living in Transition' Art Show at Ian Ross Gallery, 466 Brannan St., San Francisco. The show features a host of artists that have worked with Proof Lab directly over the years or indirectly through one of the brands the shop carries, including locals like Zio Ziegler and Mike Shine. The show runs through Oct. 15. Click here for more info.

For Tam Valley residents pining for the neighborhood grocery store they’ve been missing since December 2010, the wait is over. Well, almost.

Fairfax-based organic foods market Good Earth Natural Foods confirmed their long-in-the-works plans to open a second location in Marin, this time in the 26,000-square-foot space at 207 Flamingo Road that has been vacant since DeLano's IGA Market closed the week of Dec. 17, 2010, one of five DeLano's markets in Marin and San Francisco that shut down as part of a mass eviction of the struggling grocery chain.

Good Earth officials said they are in the planning stages of an "total renovation and aesthetic transformation" of the building under the guidance of Santa Cruz-based C/D/M Crocker-Fry, which designed and built Good Earth's Fairfax store. They are projecting that the store will open in Fall 2015.

Good Earth opened in 1969 at 123 Bolinas Avenue in Fairfax. In response to growing demand, the company moved to 1966 Sir Francis Drake Blvd. at the end of 2000, and opened its current 22,000-square-foot store in Fairfax store in February 2012 "to meet the needs of our customers who requested a larger store with more selection store-wide, wider aisles, additional check-out stands, and indoor seating."

“We have received many requests for a store in Southern Marin from folks seeking a more organic choice,” said Mark Squire, one of two partners at Good Earth. “Although organic food is still a bit pricier, we know that enough people recognize the superior quality and safety of organic food to support a store with Good Earth's commitment. We look forward to serving a new community with healthful food.”

“Along with meeting the additional market demand for what we already do, it also brings me great pleasure knowing our staff will continue to grow too - this opportunity represents real leadership growth opportunities for many current Good Earthlings,” Partner Al Baylacq added.

Good Earth officials are asking potential 94941 customers to take this survey about their new store as they seek to gather feedback on the community's priorities.

For more than a year as it underwent repairs for water damage and sat vacant, the space formerly occupied by Champagne French Bakery Cafe was at the center of the Mill Valley rumor mill: What was going to move into the prominent space at 41 Throckmorton Ave., where Champagne had been since 2002 and where the legendary deli/cafe Sonapa Farms had been from 1959 to 1995 (with a Noah's Bagels stint from 1998 to 2000 in between)?

Mill Valley has its answer, as Karen Goldberg, whose TamalPie Pizzeria has become a fixture on Miller Avenue since it opened in May 2011, plans to open Playa, a "modern Mexican serving authentic Oaxacan cuisine," Goldberg says. 

Goldberg says she's excited to bring a new restaurant to downtown, particularly into the former Champagne space. 

"I've always loved that space and I feel like it's been under-utilized," she says. "We need healthful, local, organic Mexican food in town – something that is family-friendly and casual yet sophisticated."

The moniker, the Spanish language word for beach, reflects the fact that "when you walk in, you'll feel relaxed and able to just hang out," Goldberg says, noting that she hopes to make some use of the outdoor space behind the building as well. "Put your feet in the sand, have a beer or a margarita (Playa will have a full bar) and a taco and relax."

Goldberg plans to submit a conditional use permit (CUP) application to the City of Mill Valley for the 2,000-square-foot space later this month and hopes to get a hearing within the next two months. 

Goldberg, whose sister Susan Griffin-Black is the co-founder of EO Products, which has a retail shop in downtown Mill Valley, is no newcomer to the restaurant business. More than two decades ago, she opened Rustico restaurant in San Francisco’s Potrero Hill district. A native of Pittsburgh, Pa. who has lived in Mill Valley for nearly 30 years, Goldberg closed Rustico in 1996 and then bought Annabelle’s, in the space that is now Vasco on Throckmorton Ave. at Bernard Street.

“I only had it open and running for a year and then I got pregnant and I couldn’t stand the smell of food,” Goldberg says with laugh. She sold Annabelle’s to chef Chris Majer, who then opened Vasco predecessor the Frog and the Peach.

In 1998, Goldberg took a break from the restaurant business and started flipping homes – buying houses, remodeling them and selling them. When the bottom dropped out of the real estate market, she eyed a return to the restaurant business.

“The real estate drop forced me to go back to what I really know,” Goldberg said.

Stay tuned for more details on Playa as Goldberg and her team navigate the permit process.

The Mill Valley Hat Box, which closed in early February due to serious water damage, isn't re-opening in the space at 118 Throckmorton Avenue, where it's been located for 10 years, according to shop owner Danielle Schubert.

Schubert says she's looking for a new space, "hopefully in Mill Valley," and will let us know when she does. Bob Knez of HL Commercial, which is representing the building owner, says the owners are looking for a new tenant for the space. He says the owners would prefer not to rent to a food-serving business. Contact Knez at bob@hlcre.com.

While Hat Box had a decade-long history in downtown Mill Valley, the building itself is steeped in the town's history. Frank Canepa, who emigrated from Genoa, Italy in 1913 at the age of 17, rented out half of Gosser's Meat Market, a butcher shop located at 118 Throckmorton, to open the original Mill Valley Market in July 1929. Canepa later moved the business in the 1950s to its current location at 12 Corte Madera Avenue, expanding the business over time into the adjoining office, pet shop, restaurant and bar. At 118 Throckmorton, a laundromat occupied the space for more than 20 years prior to the Hat Box opening there.

Looking to connect with local business owners to identify possible opportunities for collaboration, Whole Foods Market on Miller Avenue is hosting a Business-to-Business Meet + Greet on Monday, September 8 from 6pm-8pm at the O'Hanlon Center for the Arts.

"Whether it be catering or floral arrangements for an event or coming up with a range of ideas on how we can work together, we want to be a resource for our local business community," said Brownlie Raffaini, the store's marketing and community relations team leader.

The event will feature a bevy of great food and soft drinks, as well as a drawing for a $100 Whole Foods gift card. Attendees are encouraged to bring their business cards for the drawing. 

The 411: Whole Foods Market on Miller Avenue is hosting a Business-to-Business Meet + Greet on Monday, September 8 from 6pm-8pm at the O'Hanlon Center for the Arts. Free.

With La Ginestra in the midst of its 50th Anniversary Celebration this week, the Mill Valley City Council honored the restaurant's owners, the Aversa family, with a proclamation at its September 2nd meeting.

“We’re so glad that we can celebrate this with you,” Mayor Stephanie Moulton-Peters told Maria, Fabio, Tino and Ann Aversa Tuesday night before reading the proclamation.

Salvatore and Maria Aversa moved to Mill Valley as a recently married couple after emigrating from Sorrento, Italy. They opened their restaurant in May 1964 and named it La Ginestra after the Scotch broom vegetation that was prevalent in both the wilderness of Mount Tamalpais and in the hills surrounding their hometown.

The couple raised their three children – Lucia, Fabio and Tino – in Mill Valley. Fabio Aversa recounted to the Council a story about the family closing the restaurant briefly in 1965 so they could return to Italy for one month. At the end of the trip, Salvatore Aversa told his wife that he’d go back to Mill Valley to re-open the restaurant, and “that if nobody shows up, I’ll pack everything back up and come back to Italy,” Fabio Aversa said. Instead, he found flowers and welcome back signs and notes outside the restaurant.

“What a testament that is to this community,” Fabio Aversa said. “It’s a great place and we’re so happy to serve all of you and to continue to do so.”

As part of the 50th Anniversary Celebration, La Ginestra has asked its customers to share their memories and tributes to the restaurant on its Facebook page. Here’s a sampling:

Click here to read more tributes and to share your own. 

From mobile phones to tablets and millions of apps in between, technology is ubiquitous, and our kids’ mastery of it never fails to astound us.

But are they mastering one of the most basic functions of our digital world?

Typing, a skill that dates back to the mid-1800s in Wisconsin, is the focus of one of the newest businesses in the 94941. Barbara Schmidt’s TypeA+, which launched in Santa Rosa three years ago, opened an education center in Tam Junction earlier this month.

Schmidt, a longtime CPA who has worked for giants like KPMG, started TypeA+ because she noticed a trend among her three kids, their friends and her friends’ kids: most of them were struggling to proficient at typing.

“It didn’t seem to dawn on many parents that there was a solution,” Schmidt says. “And kids thought they actually knew the skill and the parents thought they were getting it in school – but it wasn’t happening.”

With some guidance from the Typing Institute of America, Schmidt developed a curriculum that centers on teaching children in grades 2 to 8 how to type with speed and accuracy and avoid developing bad habits that are hard to break once they become adults.

“We’ve got to get them young – when they’re eager to learn and they haven’t learned a lot of bad habits,” Schmidt says. “

Schmidt licensed proprietary software that allows her teacher to monitor students’ progress through 24 50-minute small group classes, with the software itself allowing students to pick up where they left off if they miss a session or two.

“We’re able to tailor the speed to any grade level and make it fun, with prizes, games and rewards,” she says.

TypeA+ is hosting a Grand Opening Celebration, with food and drinks and a Ribbon Cutting Ceremony with the Mill Valley Chamber of Commerce, from 4pm–6pm on Thursday, August 28 at its education center at 247 Shoreline Highway, Unit B6 – in the shopping center that contains Mathnasium and the San Francisco Running Company. Click here for more info on TypeA+.

The idea for O Baby Bar – the latest in an increasingly busy market of organic food businesses in Mill Valley – was born out of a predicament facing every first-time mom: how to get your young kids to eat healthy food, and to maintain those habits as they get older.

But unlike many new moms, Ilyse Wassermann-Petter, a New York native who moved to Mill Valley with her husband four years ago, had 15 years of experience as a practicing nutritionist from which to draw, years that had shown her how difficult it is for adults to change longstanding, non-healthy food consumption habits.

“When I had my kids, I said to myself, ‘Let’s start off with the good stuff – vegetables, fruits – and see how their taste buds evolve as they grow,” she says. “As they’ve gotten older and have easier access to junk food, they just don’t have the taste for it.”

Wassermann-Petter, whose children are now nearly 5 and 7 years old, says the results have been profound, with zero ear infections, allergies or lingering illnesses to show for it.

“It’s really become clear to me that diet plays a huge role in children's health and if we could just make it easier when they’re young that they’ll then be able to make healthy choices on their own as they get older,” she adds.

Hence the birth of O Baby Bar, which launches officially in Mill Valley on September 2 as an online ordering and food delivery service for a host of organic, healthy food and drinks.

The menu, which Wassermann-Petter says will evolve, includes a variety of organic, local, seasonal fruit and vegetable purees for babies. The kids menu contains fresh, organic choices aimed to please kids’ discerning tastes, with a variety of school lunches, homemade desserts, organic juice and smoothies as well as juices, elixirs, and cleanses for adults.

O Baby Bar has a pair of holistic chefs cooking out of a commercial kitchen in San Rafael, including Wassermann-Petter’s brother Miles as well as Megan DeWitt.

“The food has the benefit of being healthy at a different level,” Wassermann-Petter says. “We personalize and specialize the food toward the clients’ needs.”

Wassermann-Petter says she eventually hopes to have a brick-and-mortar location in Mill Valley, complete with educational workshops on nutritional topics in the evening that makes the space a hub for “healthy, delicious food in our community.”

But while she’s searching for the right space in Mill Valley, she also didn’t want to wait any longer to bring her concept into fruition. She says she’s gotten great feedback from other parents community about the concept, particularly at the 2014 Wine, Beer & Gourmet Food Tasting event on June 22, where she had a booth and served up treats that included an organic medjool date stuffed with an herbed cashew cream and organic strawberries dipped into a carob coconut dip.

“This is such an educated, progressive healthy population of families here,” Wassermann-Petter says. “These are the parents that would take to this concept – they ultimately believe in it but they don’ realize how influential they can be on their kids’ palates.”

As she’s refined the concept, Wasserman-Petter has seen the marketplace for similar ideas grow immensely, including locally at Urban Remedy, which opened in downtown Mill Valley one year ago, Juice Girl, which opened next to Starbucks in the Safeway shopping center in June, and the soon-to-open Nekter in Strawberry Village, as well beyond the 94941 with Starbucks Founder Howard Schultz's Evolution juice bars.

“It was just a matter of time,” Wassermann-Petter says of the trend. “It was almost more odd and strange to me that these places didn’t exist in Mill Valley – the community really lends itself to have a lot of choice for these kinds of businesses. And I like some healthy competition – it shows me that this is where the trends are going and this is what the community is asking for now.”

The 411: O Baby Bar has its menu and ordering system on its website. Stay tuned for the evolution of its menu.