Why did Ina Garten's Barefoot Contessa close?

She probably has more lucrative enterprises. And it’s probably not profitable enough; with rents rising in town, mom and pop businesses are folding like crazy, and there’s an influx of big-name retailers like Tiffany and J. Crew.

Years ago, we popped in and chicken salad was like $35.00/lb. Little containers of gummi candies were $12.

Our family used to have a small retail shop on Newtown Lane decades ago, and it was all small businesses, and the character of the town was very different. It’s gotten impersonal and glitzy. Maybe we sound like typical old-timers longing for simpler times. But it was better then.

Ina’s better off than others who’ve had to close up shop.

Jeez, $35 for a pound of chicken salad.

What Ina said in the Martha Stewart piece was that she bought the building that house BC but I think it was just not economical with 25-50 employees.

Her fat ass got tired of it.

I thought she sold the store/business years before it went under.

This is what happened in NYC’s West Village as well. They try to sell $32 omelettes then get upset because they can’t get people to return regularly as a business model that’s worked for 100 years. I worked at Robert Kree Salon and to pay $60K a month rent we’d have to charge $400 a haircut... it doesn’t make sense.

She sold the business to the employees years before it closed.

She sold the store but kept the brand. Eventually the store went bust - without her attached it didn’t do as well. some blame Ina, others don’t. It seems to depend on your existing view of her.