Fog City News in the Financial District is closing after 22 years in business.
Kevin Y./YelpFog City News, a celebrated Financial District retailer of magazines, chocolates and other goods, will close for good on New Year’s Eve after 22 years in business, its owner announced.
Where most newsstands have a couple dozen magazines, Fog City News, at 445 Market St., offers customers more than 1,200 titles. It has more than 1,000 greeting cards on display — at least 100 of which contain a swear word, I’m told. Zero of its products are available for purchase online, harkening back to the good old days when one had to — dare we say — set foot inside a brick-and-mortar store for reading materials.
“I gave my business the name Fog City News as a tribute to San Francisco,” said founder and owner Adam Smith in a statement sent to SFGATE. “And I felt it was my duty to represent this city as best as I could to visitors by offering a welcoming, elegantly old-fashioned atmosphere, attentive service, and the very best products I could find.”
Fog City News in the Financial District is closing after 22 years in business.
Catherine W./YelpThe shop repeatedly won accolades for best newsstand and best chocolate shop in its more than two decades in business. As the latter designation suggests, Fog City News was a destination not just for cards and magazines but fine cocoa products. In its time, the store evaluated more than 5,000 chocolate bars, according to the press release.
Smith said he is not closing the store due to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic nor health or landlord issues (the reasons so many small businesses have been forced to shutter in recent years). He’s merely ready for the next rodeo.
“Ultimately, I accomplished everything that I set out to do with Fog City News (and some things I had no idea I was setting out to do!) And now I’m ready for a new chapter,” Smith said. “I feel lucky to be riding off into the sunset on my own terms.”
