I found a blog post from the Editor of El Paso Times today. Apparently, Chris thinks that El Paso Downtown needs is a Cheese Cake Factory. A quick internet search on Chris and I was able to find out that he’s lived in El Paso for only 9 months (it is incredible what you can find on the internet, isn’t it?). We will give him the benefit of the doubt, but my guess is that he has not fallen for El Paso yet (hopefully he will).

I think it is sad to see someone as influential as Chris think that way. However I was glad to see that within the comments to his blog most people were pro local restaurants, rather than a chain. This shows that Homegrown El Paso’s efforts are appreciated by some people, and hopefully those people will help Homegrown El Paso and especially El Paso improve.

Chris, this is my response to your comment: I really don’t think that a chain restaurant is something that could bring more people downtown than a good local restaurant. Why go to a restaurant that you can find pretty much anywhere in America, rather than a restaurant that offers a unique and captivating El Paso experience? We, El Pasoans, do not want El Paso to be more like Denver, or New York, or Chicago, or any other city for that matter. There are a lot of things to learn from such cities but we want El Paso to be more like… well, El Paso. We want to keep and reflect the unique mix of cultures our city represents, we want to keep El paso unique and different from any other city. Plus, how can downtown benefit if when we eat at a chain restaurant, more than 85% of the money spent goes out of town? (see the Austin’s City Economics Report).

If you doubt that there is a local restaurant that can bring crowds together, I invite you to read Lisa Degliantoni’s post about the Cheesecake Factory vs Chicos Tacos (I agree, not my preferred choice for a local restaurant), and  if you haven’t been to any of the following restaurants, let me know, I will personally take you.

The Greenery, Singapore Cafe, Los Bandidos de Carlos and Mickeys, Cappetos, L&J Cafe, Cafe Central (this one is actually downtown already), Ardovinos Dessert Crossing, Great American Land & Cattle, Los Gallegos, or Michellino’s (just to name a few).

Don’t worry, the bill is on me. These restaurants add a unique flavor to El Paso and they could easily be “crowd pullers”. Just try to get a table in any of them during lunch time.

Just like Don Baumgardt says, “I’ve never heard of anyone who wants to go to San Francisco because they have a great Olive Garden”.

On a side note: Homegrown El Paso was thinking about advertising Independent’s week in The El Paso Times. Chris was on a meeting with Don, Nancy and the rest of the editorial board of The EP Times a week before he posted his blog. The meeting was about Homegrown’s Independent’s week. Maybe Chris’ blog post will be a big influence on the board’s decision to buy a very expensive ad in The EP Times or not.