According to ‘Vendor Power’, a report published by the ‘The Street Vendor Project’, there are ‘more than 10,000 street vendors in New York City. These merchants sell everything from food to clothes, books to paintings. But with the Pope visiting the city this week, many of these vendors will be selling Papal merchandise.
“The Pope is in demand now. I’m selling badges, magnets, bracelets and calendars, the calendars are fast moving”, says Denise Thomas, who holds a US military veteran vending license. Selling food and common goods for the past 20 years, she notes, “Everybody wants a souvenir of the Pope, specially the ones with a date on them. Soon, the price too is going to increase. This two-dollar badge will be sold for five dollars in no time!”
A store dedicated to the Pope’s visit too opened its doors in Philadelphia’s Aramark Tower, located at 11th and Market. Being the first pop-up to sell official merchandise of Pope, the World Meeting of Families have a fundraising goal of $45 million and have already touched $30 million with in-store and online sales.
Amy Maloney, a store retailer can’t stock papal products fast enough and expects to have sold more than 10,000 T-shirts, 5,000 mugs and 10,000 Pope Francis prayer cards by the end of the month.
Placed right outside St. Patrick’s Cathedral on 5th Avenue and 50th Street, Thomas travels around with her portable cart complete with umbrella and torchlight.
“It’s not very difficult for me to move around. I get the stuff from the Bangladeshi wholesalers on 20th something street and I come here.” Residing in Brooklyn, she states, “I take the subway and it takes me 45 minutes to get home, but it’s not a problem as this stuff is light, you know,” says Thomas.
“This Pope stuff is really expensive! The Pope with the ‘peace’ sign was for 500 dollars and this one, with the hand waiving for $280, so I just got this one,” says Dan Kay, who is Jew and holds a religious vending license says, Kay lets his customers pose with a Pope cutout for 3 dollars. They get a mask if they pay for $5.
“Everybody loves this Pope! He’s so cool, I mean c’mon he has his own football team and supports San Lorenzo! Now how cool is that?” says Kay.
Kay ran into trouble with the NYPD as he was setting up his stall close to 8:00pm in Times Square. The reason the police checked his papers; he clarifies “No, no I have all my paper work in place. They don’t bother me much, they just wanted me to move a few feet inside because I was too close to the crossing.” According to ‘Vendor Power’, the law enforces street vendors to place their stalls ‘10 feet away from a signal, more than 20 feet from a store entrance and less than 18 inches to the street’, a rule Kay had violated but was quick to fix.
“The Pope will bring in many people and they will bring in many vendors, who will sell their Pope material for cheaper than the gift shop, but of course their quality won’t be the same and most will not even have the license to sell. We’ll have to see what happens to them”, says Ming Chan, a restoration worker for four years at St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
