New shop welcomes customers despite lingering challenges

After more than three years of delays due to conflicts with landlords, contractors and the city, 2 Guys Bagels is now open at 756 Fourth Ave., at the corner of 25th Street.

In January, the Sunset Post reported on the difficulties the shop’s owners were having as they tried to open. One of the owners, Johnny Sulaiman, spoke about the problems he had encountered and how much money he and the other owners had lost while waiting for the shop to open. The delays cost the owners hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Now, although some problems persist — for example, an enormous bagel-making machine still sits unused in the back of the shop until further notice — the shop is open for business and thriving, according to manager Hamood.

“We’re open and doing very well,” said Hamood, a relative of the owners.

Hamood is running the store for now not only because of his family connections, but because he wants to make sure the business succeeds.

“I think young people running businesses are good. For one thing, if an older person were running this shop, they probably wouldn’t even want to talk to a newspaper, but it’s so valuable to talk to the community,” Hamood said. “When I designed the menu, I was making sure to pay attention to what food is popular, maybe kind of viral, so we’re keeping up with the times. For example, we have toasts here, like our burrata and peaches toast. One woman comes in here every day to get it. My favorite is the chicken vodka parm on ciabatta.”

Beyond his pride in the menu, Hamood is happy with the diversity of the clientele coming in.

“We have Spanish people, white people, Middle Eastern people,” Hamood said. “And I don’t want to talk bad about delis — I love them — but sometimes I felt like, working in them, you didn’t get to see the community as much because they’re not places people hang out. But here, we got families coming in, people doing laptop work, friends hanging out. You never see that at a bodega.”

One customer, Jubi, came in on her way to get flowers nearby. She said she saw the storefront and came in out of curiosity but was surprised to see how big it was inside.

When she ordered a matcha latte, Hamood asked if she wanted strawberry in it and let her try the strawberry puree they make in the store. She enjoyed it but chose to stick with her matcha order, which she orders wherever she goes for tea.

“I love it in here,” Jubi said. “I’m definitely going to come back regularly because my daughter goes to the school right near here.”

Still, not everything is perfect. There are still issues to work out with the landlord, and the bagel machine still isn’t working, so for the time being they are getting bagels from another shop that bakes them fresh. They also need to make adjustments to the kitchen ventilation system.

“The hood needs to be bigger. We need to find someone who’s gonna fix it, then figure out how to fix it,” Hamood said. “There’s always more issues.”

He is optimistic, however, that every problem will be resolved, including getting the bagel machine up and running so they can make bagels in-house.

After the interview concluded, Hamood said he had one final thought he wanted to include in the piece.

“I just really want to emphasize how happy we are just to be here. All our regulars that are already coming in, I thank them all the time.”