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One among Vancouver’s oldest and most iconic vegetarian eating places is up on the market, listed on-line as a “future redevelopment property.”

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The Naam Restaurant, together with the land and constructing on West 4th Ave. — which features a two-bedroom suite above the restaurant — is listed on the market at just below $8 million.

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The Naam opened in 1968 and was initially a well-liked assembly place for antiwar advocates, environmentalists and different counterculture teams. Positioned within the coronary heart of what was then generally known as “Rainbow Street,” it has served vegetarian meals for over 50 years.

“The previous story goes that Greenpeace really began in a nook of the Naam,” mentioned Jacob Beauregard, weekend supervisor on the Naam. He mentioned the group reportedly deliberate its first marketing campaign within the restaurant.

“I feel round the place desk 19 is perhaps proper now,” he mentioned.

Marie Bohlen, an American illustrator dwelling in Vancouver, urged what was to turn into Geenpeace’s first marketing campaign in February of 1970. She proposed crusing a ship north to a U.S. nuclear take a look at website in Alaska.

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Beauregard mentioned the present house owners, who’ve run the Naam for the reason that early ’70s, had been now of their 70s themselves and seeking to retire.

“From what I perceive their youngsters are doing fully various things, professionally,” Beauregard mentioned. “No one’s actually desirous to take (the restaurant) on.”

Beauregard, who has labored on the Naam since round 2015, mentioned employees have been anxious and unhappy after studying in late August that the restaurant was being put up on the market. Many have labored on the restaurant for years, together with one lady who’s now in her 70s.

“They know the place very well,” Beauregard mentioned. “They, fairly frankly, deserve a variety of respect. They usually’re anxious about having to begin at a brand new place the place they don’t get the respect that they’re used to.”

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“The Naam has given me a variety of alternatives in life,” Beauregard added. “I’m about to graduate and I’d have by no means began college with out the Naam.”

The actual property itemizing advertises the property as a “future redevelopment property” but additionally highlights the “excessive profile” restaurant on the bottom ground, which the itemizing claims earns over $1.5 million yearly.

Beauregard mentioned he didn’t know what would occur if the restaurant needed to transfer however mentioned he felt the Naam has “a sure recipe for achievement” that set it other than different vegetarian eating places.

“We nonetheless make every thing from scratch,” he mentioned. “We actually concentrate on high quality sourcing.”

He mentioned the constructing itself was a giant a part of the restaurant’s success, too.

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“A few of this furnishings has been right here for the reason that draft dodgers constructed it,” he mentioned. “This constructing’s received previous glassware, it’s very distinctive.”

In line with the Vancouver Heritage Basis, the constructing housing the Naam was inbuilt 1920. The constructing’s exterior has remained largely unchanged because it was first constructed.

A dry items store was the first tenant of the constructing, adopted by a bakery within the Nineteen Thirties. A laundromat opened within the Fifties, adopted by Love Cafe till 1968, when the Naam opened.

The Naam is the one remaining authentic pure meals enterprise from the Nineteen Sixties in Kitsilano, based on the Vancouver Heritage Basis.

It doesn’t take reservations, as a substitute working on a first-come-first-serve foundation.

ngriffiths@postmedia.com

twitter.com/njgriffiths

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