For many years Cipriani restaurant at 55 Wall St. (aka Cipriani Club 55) has been a staple location for Financial District's lunchers with company-paid expense accounts: classy, convenient, prestigious, comfortable, and moderately tasty (not enough to distract you from a business conversation, yet sufficiently to leave you and your guests satisfied). And, of course, the drinkers can tease themselves here with famous Bellinis, that pre-war invention of Giuseppe Cipriani - a mix of Prosecco (the Italian answer to Champagne) and peach puree; the only coral-pink drink in a flute I've ever seen straight men drink.
Being tied up in Midtown offices for years and always insistent on people coming to my turf, I have not been at this Cipriani location for a while. Now, firmly based on Broad St., I am basically around the corner from the place. So, it was only natural that an institutional investor picked it for a lunch meeting with me.
I arrived first and had a chance to observe the scenery for several minutes without any distractions. So, this is what it's like here now? For a hot second I thought I was in a wrong restaurant. I remember the place being abuzz, full of men and a few women in Italian suits, their conversations merging into one low-volume background sound. Now, at 1 pm (the busiest of the lunch-time hours) the restaurant's occupancy is about 40%, which is not enough to blend the voices – you can clearly make out dialogues at different tables.
The most remarkable change, though, is in the contingent of patrons. While all suits in attendance were of the familiar ilk (well, maybe not all of Italian make anymore – my observation is that Brooks Brothers' off-the-rack outfits, now predominately made in China, are gaining more and more ground here), there were several tables occupied by new fixtures.
There were two (!) Russian tables. The largest round table in the middle of the restaurant was occupied by a mixed-gender group of New Russians: Rolexes, Cartier tchotchkes, Zegna (men) and Chanel (women) suits, skirts too tight and too short, hills too high, voices too loud, full bottles of drinks on the table. Several tables away from them, in a much quieter corner, were two Russian models: 6-feet tall with legs growing out of their armpits, long dirty-blond hair, indistinguishable faces with unnoticeable makeup, Roberto Cavalli jeans and blouses, marinated salmon and water on the table. Well, nowadays, these people are everywhere.
It was really another couple that surprised me: A young (at least by the contemporary standards - about 38) stay-at-home Dad with his 4-year-old daughter on his lap. Both of them were wearing high quality, expensive, but tastefully understated and casual clothes. Except that the girl's outfit and hair were somewhat disheveled, apparently from unyielding resistance to Dad's feeding attempts (hence the lap position – to prevent spontaneous running).
The truth is, though, I shouldn't have been surprised. This pair was here probably for the same reason the Russian models were: most likely they live nearby, in one of many Financial District's ex-office buildings, now converted by their owners into condos to increase occupancy and profits. They belong to the previously unimaginable in this area dog-walking crowd I try to get through every evening on my way home from the office.
Don't get me wrong, this is not about Cipriani's shrinking revenues. Who the fuck cares? I don't. These people have hotels and restaurants all over the world; they've soldered through tax evasion suits and who knows what else. Both Club 55 and Cipriani Grand Central are still prime choices for many non-profit, political, and commercial organizations hosting fundraisers and galas. And I hear that the wedding business is going strong.
But I view all these shifts and changes, largely unnoticed by others, as evidence supporting my strong opinion that we live in a new economic stage – the one that doesn't fit into Nobel-prize-winning formulas; the one that leads rational thinkers to pessimistic predictions of the future that's coming both to Main Street and Wall Street. Of course, we can pacify ourselves by saying that Cipriani is too outdated and stuffy; that the younger high-rollers prefer hipper places at nearby Peck Slip and other tiny waterfront streets. But surely that alone wouldn't account for the dramatically reduced attendance in this brand-name establishment.
A sober eye cannot help but track the obvious trend: the empty tables; the unoccupied offices; the converted buildings; the diminishing number of Italian suits on display. It illustrates only too well a poignant number recently featured in New York Magainzine's Approval Matrix: 46% of New Yorkers are barely making more than the poverty threshold. And it is pretty clear to me that, contrary to the popular opinion, 53.99% of the City's population don't make quite as much as they used to either. The remaining 0.01% (not 1%, you fools!) are in a position to never get affected by any economic changes. They can have Bellinis (and everything else) any time they want.
The Frustrated CFO 