{"id":3490,"date":"2012-02-12T07:16:36","date_gmt":"2012-02-12T07:16:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/?p=3490"},"modified":"2017-02-13T21:09:51","modified_gmt":"2017-02-14T05:09:51","slug":"for-consumers-the-best-monterey-peninsula-businesses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/for-consumers-the-best-monterey-peninsula-businesses\/","title":{"rendered":"For Consumers: The Best Monterey Peninsula Businesses (and the Worst)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Best (and worst) Monterey Peninsula Businesses<\/strong><\/p>\n

A business only gets on this list if —<\/p>\n

1. I have had direct personal experience with them, and
\n2. They have provided exceptional service,<\/strong> reliably – with no bad experiences.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

These local businesses prove that there are solid reasons for buying some<\/u> services and products locally and not over the internet \/ web. It is notable that several of these excellent businesses are large corporations – both privately and publicly owned.
\n
\nFood :<\/p>\n

Trader Joe’s<\/strong> – Fabulous Team (Pacific Grove and Monterey)<\/span>
\n Costco – (Sand City)<\/span>
\nCarmel Tuesday Farmer’s Market<\/strong> –\u00a0Best Carrots\u00a0<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Restaurants :<\/p>\n

Tillie Gorts (Pacific Grove)<\/a><\/span>
\n La Playa<\/strong> (for lunch) (Carmel)<\/span>
\n Passionfish (Pacific Grove)<\/span>
\n Papa Chanos<\/strong> (Monterey) 646-9587<\/span>
\nChina Gourmet (Carmel- sadly, closed in 2012)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Office \/ Camera Equipment :<\/p>\n

Staples (Seaside – excellent customer service)<\/span>
\n Costco (Sand City – best place to get a camera)<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Batteries, Home<\/p>\n

Dollar Tree (Seaside, Fremont St)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Gasoline :<\/p>\n

Station at Corner of David and Hawthorne (Monterey)
\nStation at Costco – (Sand City)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Car Repair :<\/p>\n

Advantage Auto – (Monterey) 372-4188<\/span>
\n Hans Auto Repair – (Sand City) 831-583-9820<\/a><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Smog Test :<\/p>\n

Jack Fox Auto Repair 394-3994<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Tires :<\/p>\n

Goodyear (Seaside) 899 4900<\/s> No longer recommended as they refused to take care of a tire defect.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

House Cleaning and Property Maintenance :<\/p>\n

Compulsive Cleaning<\/strong> and Care-Taking 915-6397<\/span>
\n C.K. Services<\/strong> 224-9899<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Plumbing:<\/p>\n

Middlebrook<\/strong> Plumbing<\/span>, Pacific Grove<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Electrical Work:<\/p>\n

Houston<\/strong> Electrics, 899 5716<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Building Materials :<\/p>\n

Hayward Lumber (Pacific Grove)
\nM&S (Monterey)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hardware :<\/p>\n

ACE Hardware (on Pacific Grove’s Forest Hill near Trader Joe’s)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Delivery:<\/p>\n

Fed-Ex<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Retirement Community:<\/p>\n

Canterbury Woods<\/strong> (Pacific Grove)<\/a> (I’ve had family members and friends live here, Very happily.)<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Jig Saw Puzzles \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

I’m Puzzled (Pacific Grove)<\/a> Update: Sadly so its wonderful owner, Mary, closed this business closed in 2012 so she could retire.Brilliantly, she reopened it in about 2014.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Shoes :<\/p>\n

Feet R Us (Seaside)<\/a>\u00a0Sadly closed in 2012<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Bike Shops<\/strong> :<\/p>\n

None !<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I do not list medical or financial businesses.
\nYou might note no businesses are listed for Bike Shops, Clothing Stores, and a few other categories – because I can’t find any locally that provide reliable exceptional service<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Then other businesses, even those owned by friends, (e.g. Massage, Roofers, Psychologists, Pet stores and services) are absent ONLY because I have not yet needed or used their services.<\/p>\n

=======
\nExcellent Closed Businesses:<\/p>\n

The Thunderbird<\/strong> – Bookstore and Restaurant – May Waldroup (Carmel valley mouth)<\/span>
\n Triples<\/strong> Restaurant – Tommy Tucker, (Monterey)<\/span>
\n Coco Le Fleur<\/strong> Restaurant – Madame and Paola Berthoin (Carmel Valley)<\/span>
\n Bruised Reed<\/strong> – Restaurant (Monterey)<\/span>
\n Beau Thai<\/strong> Restaurant – David Walton (Cannery Row)<\/span><\/p>\n

Eureka<\/strong> Federal Savings Bank – Bill Sosic, Manager (Pacific Grove)<\/span>
\n San Francisco<\/strong> Federal Savings Bank (Carmel)<\/span><\/p>\n

Sadly, both wonderful banks\u00a0were gobbled up by corporadoes and turned awful.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

=======
\nBad Actors<\/u>: Businesses I will never again deal with:<\/p>\n

Morgan Stanley<\/strong> \/ Dean Witter (Monterey – supremely arrogant assholes. it is no surprise to me that they were fined more than $10 billion for their role in Mortgage mess and co-mingling client funds. They are still facing criminal charges.)
\nPebble Beach Company<\/strong> – Our leading local Eco-Frauds. Still trying to get you to believe that their destruction
\nBank of America<\/strong> (Do you need to ask?)
\nWells Fargo Bank<\/strong> (systematic false charges = theft)
\nDr. Charlie Bates<\/strong> (Lost or destroyed all our family medical records and still refuses to return our calls as of 2016.)
\nBay Photo Lab<\/strong> (New Monterey)
\nHome Despot<\/strong>
\nJay Leno TV show advertisers (Mean remarks and mean guests! Johnny Carson<\/strong> never once said a mean thing in his decades on the show)
\nHonda of Monterey<\/strong> (Thankfully closed. )<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Bad Actors<\/u>: Monopolies I will never again deal with when there is any alternative:<\/p>\n

ATT Phone company<\/span>
\n PG$E Electric and Gas (Literally killed 14 people in San Bruno)<\/span>
\n California-American Water Company (Cal-Am)<\/span>
\nUS Post Office<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

* Note \u2013 While some of these businesses are run by or employ friends, I have not received any remuneration or discounts that are not available to you — for any of these recommendations. And sadly, while there are other likely fabulous businesses – I just have never had personal experience with them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Best (and worst) Monterey Peninsula Businesses A business only gets on this list if — 1. I have had direct personal experience with them, and 2. They have provided exceptional service, reliably – with no bad experiences. These local … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3490"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8092,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3490\/revisions\/8092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/daviddilworth.com\/pol\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}