![]() ![]() “They have seven Agway stores in Connecticut, now they have my five stores, and they want to open more stores throughout New England,” he explained. Ratner explained the change in ownership in a video on Facebook, and said the new owners are not part of a national chain. He said all the employees who worked at the Dave’s Soda and Pet City locations continued on with the new owners. “It’s been six months they’re still doing the same things I did,” he noted. Ratner also said they will essentially operate the same as Dave’s Soda and Pet City has for years. The stores, he said, have already changed names to Smithland Supplies and will remain pet supply stores. “Many times a company sells and new owners say nothing’s going to change and two seconds later everything changes.” “I just wanted everyone to see that things are really the same,” he said. Ratner told Reminder Publishing he didn’t tell anyone about the change in ownership because he “didn’t want to scare the customers. Ratner also joked, “I needed a place to go every day so my wife doesn’t kill me.” He said it was all just “getting to be too much,” but still “wanted to stay active in the business.” So he kept the Agawam business, which is close to his house and where he owns the building. “A couple of the leases were up, and it’s time to start winding down.” “When I hit 65, several years ago, my kids moved away, they didn’t want the business,” he said. Ratner said he sold the businesses for several reasons. ![]() About six months ago, Ratner sold all locations except the Agawam one, which he described as his “forever home” in a video on Facebook. "Why people are taking it out on me for going to Washington to do something that I thought was going to do good for millions of people, I just don't get it," he tells WBUR.AGAWAM – The owner of Dave’s Soda and Pet City, a local pet supply chain, has sold five of his stores keeping only the Agawam location.ĭave Ratner previously owned the five stores, which were located in Ludlow, Hadley, Northampton, Ware, Agawam, and Stafford, CT. And it will alienate customers in the cluster of towns that voted for Trump, such as Ludlow and Agawam, home to two of Ratner’s seven stores, who would have been inclined to rally around him in the face of a liberal backlash. Ratner’s response to the threats of boycotts and vicious things being said about him on social media has been to repudiate the Trump White House.Īgain, that’s not necessarily the most savvy thing to do, because it won’t win back anybody on the left who has a political litmus test for where they buy dog food. And now his repudiation of Trump has angered conservative customers. His appearance wiped out business from liberals. ![]() Ratner has hired a PR firm to manage the crisis, and he's got one now, Globe columnist Kevin Cullen writes. “I absolutely abhor what he did, and I would not have been there had I known what was happening,” Ratner said. Trump’s order was swiftly followed Thursday by a second move, halting a subsidy that makes health coverage affordable for many low-income citizens - an action that drew a lawsuit from Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey. He said he had no idea about the scope of the rollback of the ACA included in the executive order. He didn't think long or hard about whether to attend. “My first reaction was ‘Holy smokes, he’s doing something good,’ ” Ratner said. Ratner received a call from the federation, inviting him to a ceremony in which Trump would sign an order restoring that power to small businesses. ![]() Since then, he has trekked to Washington, D.C., annually, talking to anyone who will listen about how unfair that is.įast-forward to two weeks ago. With the 2010 passage of the Affordable Care Act, this negotiating power vanished. For years through this federation, his company and others negotiated for cheaper group insurance rates, giving them some of the advantages large companies have. Now he's finding out is they don't do business with people they don't.įor those willing to hear it, here’s the back story: Ratner is an active member of the National Retail Federation, a trade association supportive of small businesses. “My theory on doing business is that all things being equal, people do business with people they like,” he said. A social media campaign is organizing a boycott of his business. His customers have been calling his store to complain. “I feel like I walked into a room, and somebody shot somebody when I was in the room, and so people are looking at me,” he tells the Boston Globe today. US President Donald Trump shows an executive order which he just signed on health insurance on Octoin the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, DC. ![]()
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