Level floors, bulletproof glass, and a constant flow of liquor-loving customers from the plasma center… Here’s your chance to get rich in Ypsi… Brandy’s is for sale!

Because every time I write about Brandy’s I get a lot of really good comments, here’s the latest, by way of Craigslist.

brandys2

I just think it’s funny that they describe it as the “hottest” liquor store in town, given that they were busted for fencing stolen merchandise a few years ago.

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28 Comments

  1. Posted January 30, 2014 at 9:57 pm | Permalink

    And it’s not so much that they want to sell it as they have to sell it…. as they were ordered by the court to sell the liquor license and the business. I believe they had sold it, but apparently the new owners took off. Now it looks as thought the Hannas are putting it up for sale again.

  2. Posted January 30, 2014 at 10:00 pm | Permalink

    So, if you’ve got an entrepreneurial spirt, and $300,000 cash, come to Ypsi and start selling liquor to the constant stream of happy plasma donors flowing across Michigan Avenue.

  3. Andrew Clock
    Posted January 30, 2014 at 10:02 pm | Permalink

    I posted this to twitter last night and Tom Perkins told me that picture used in the ad is his and was taken from aa.com. The fellow who appears in the picture is a “suspected” drug dealer. In his own words:

    Store owners convicted of selling stolen goods stole my shot of a drug dealer in front of their store for a CL ad. http://t.co/Ui76RKQZOH …— PomTerkins (@PomTerkins) January 30, 2014

  4. Posted January 30, 2014 at 10:07 pm | Permalink

    So should I expect a DMCA Takedown Notice from Tom?

  5. anonymous
    Posted January 30, 2014 at 10:27 pm | Permalink

    I’ve never seen “level floors” noted in a real estate listing. I don’t disagree that it’s a good thing, but I thought that it was one of those kinds of things, like “not full of cat-sized scorpions”, that you just kind of take for granted.

  6. Tim
    Posted January 30, 2014 at 11:13 pm | Permalink

    The sad thing is, it would actually make a nice little market. It’s a great location, and it straddles a few different neighborhoods and demographics. It’s not worth $950,000 though.

  7. John Galt
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 9:07 am | Permalink

    Wouldn’t it be more efficient, and a lot safer, if they sold alcohol at the plasma center? Or, better yet, what if they just traded blood for vodka? Let the free market do what it does best.

  8. Mr. Y
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 9:37 am | Permalink

    I wonder how long the line would be for a Blood for Vodka Exchange.

  9. Sparklemotion
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 9:48 am | Permalink

    I’m SO happy they made mention of the blood bank.

  10. AndyC
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 10:20 am | Permalink

    Anyone can post a Craigslist ad so it’s probably just a hoax, but who knows. Maybe I’ll walk over there this weekend and ask them about it. As for the level floors, they were really bad in the past. Since the renovation the floors are real nice, in fact the entire place is in pretty good shape. You all should go in there sometime. It’s really clean and they have tons of microbrews in stock. If it doesn’t get legit business to keep running it’ll gradually return to catering to the criminal element. It can be “their” party store or “our” party store. You decide.

  11. Posted January 31, 2014 at 10:37 am | Permalink

    Awwww, I was posting as LaidOffTeacherPatti on that earlier post! Those days, those days!

    I really wasn’t going to buy this until I saw the thing about the new bulletproof window. I’m in.

  12. Mr. Y
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 10:37 am | Permalink

    Andy,

    Do you know what happened to the most recent owner? As a condition of the court case, the Hannas had to sell the business (to a non-relative) before it could be reopened, which they apparently did. (They were allowed to keep ownership of the building, but not the business or the liquor license, as I understand it.) Assuming this Craigslist post is legit, that means the person who bought it is now either gone, or looking to leave. I’m curious as to what happened.

  13. Elf
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 11:00 am | Permalink

    We should put cameras in Brandy’s and have our own, private, online 24-hour reality show.

  14. 734
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 11:10 am | Permalink

    Don’t open the cooler in the corner.

    http://forgifs.com/gallery/d/215583-1/Star-Wars-C-3PO-removes-warning.gif

  15. Robert
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 12:19 pm | Permalink

    This might be a better location for the Mark Maynard Museum and gift shop I was planning to put in the old Tyner Furniture building. It’s more easily accessible from the freeway.

  16. Idea Man
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 12:31 pm | Permalink

    Putting aside for the moment that they’re asking $950,000 for a cinder block building in Ypsilanti, can someone answer a really basic question for me. If the Hannas aren’t allowed to operate the business, and if the person who had purchased it from them took off, who’s running the store right now?

  17. Idea Man
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 12:34 pm | Permalink

    Also, John, a real entrepreneur would find a way to extract the vodka from their blood and resell it to them.

  18. Posted January 31, 2014 at 1:27 pm | Permalink

    You can always use the Street View picture of the building: https://maps.google.com/?ll=42.237934,-83.624773&spn=0.000604,0.000561&t=h&z=21&layer=c&cbll=42.237934,-83.624773&panoid=Ifn4zd4N54BwU9l6YXqxLA&cbp=12,335.19,,0,7.43

  19. AndyC
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 2:30 pm | Permalink

    I really have no clue what’s going on. Early official releases from the city claimed the new owner, of the business and license, was found by the Hanna’s (original owners) lawyer and the sale was approved by the Michigan liquor board and the city. It’s hard to say if he is a part of everyday operations or has someone else managing it. It’s definatly not doing the business it did in the old days and there alway seems to be different people working the counter these days. I’m surprised he didn’t just hire the Hanna’s to manage his new buisness. If the ad is legit, they maybe advertising it somewhere else where than just on craigslist. Who knows.

  20. Robert Davis
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 6:56 pm | Permalink

    LOL,
    if it’s not a hoax, I hope the owners are square with the IRS. Stating $25,000 a week
    in writing on a public forum, LOL. Classic.

  21. AndyC
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 7:01 pm | Permalink

    I just went in there and ask if it’s for sale. The guy behind the counter said “no, we’re the new owners” so I showed him the ad and he was surprised. So who knows what’s going on.

  22. Robert Davis
    Posted January 31, 2014 at 7:17 pm | Permalink

    Gotta love this town.

  23. Tango Uniform
    Posted February 1, 2014 at 12:24 am | Permalink

    “Blood bank across the street brings lots of customers.”
    Thats a hoot.
    Its a goddamn blood plasma donor center, the last resort (before some kind of criminal activity) of people desperate for money to support their substance abusing lifestyle. They can get maybe $5.35 for a pint of their blood, from which the plasma is extracted. Those “customers” are pretty thirsty after donating blood, so they can stumble across the street to Brandy’s and purchase a couple of half-pints of 5 o’clock vodka or gin for $2.49 a bottle. Thats a great business model.
    I think George Orwell or Aldous Huxley predicted situations like this as the logical result of capitalism, in one of their stories.

  24. Posted February 1, 2014 at 8:06 am | Permalink

    That was my thought exactly, Robert, when I read the “we’re making $25k a week” part. You just know that statement is going to have implications for them down the line with the IRS.

  25. Posted February 1, 2014 at 10:24 am | Permalink

    And thank you for the reporting, Andy.

  26. bleh
    Posted February 2, 2014 at 8:49 pm | Permalink

    Not everybody who donates to the plasma center is trying to feed a drug habit. i donated there for a bit to help offset some bills and student loans. I made about 50 a week doing it. yeah it sucked and there were some shady people, but most people were students orworking poor. You all sound like a bunch of snob assholes.

  27. Meta
    Posted February 4, 2014 at 4:33 pm | Permalink

    The Ann Arbor News has a story about it today.

    The building is still owned by the Hanna family but was most recently rented to an associate and Eastpointe Happy’s Pizza owner, Frank Oraha. Oraha renamed the business Roundbottle, though it was briefly called EMU Liquor.

    An LCC representative confirmed in an email that Oraha owns the liquor licenses but has several violations dating back to August 2013 for bouncing approximately $11,000 in checks to pay for liquor.

    When reached by the Ann Arbor News on Thursday at the number listed in the ad, Sam Hanna identified himself as the one selling the business, but Hanna hung up when an Ann Arbor News reporter identified himself. Hanna’s last known lawyer, Lawrence Shulman, did not return calls.

    On Friday, Andrea Miller, a spokeswoman for the LCC, wrote in an email that Hanna cannot legally sell the liquor license. She did not respond to questions whether the LCC’s enforcement department was concerned that it appeared Hanna was selling the business and liquor licenses. After the Ann Arbor News began making calls, Frank Oraha’s name was added to the Craigslist ad on Friday.

    In an undercover raid by the Michigan State Police and Ypsilanti Police Department in 2010, Brian Hanna was caught receiving and selling stolen goods, including liquor, to undercover investigators on five occasions.

    On Aug. 6, 2012, the Michigan Liquor Control Commission ordered the two liquor licenses owned by Hanna Brothers Worldwide be placed in escrow until they were transferred to someone not related to the family.

    The order allowed the Hannas to operate the store, but prohibited them from selling liquor. They rented the building and sold the liquor licenses to Oraha, who opened sometime in July.

    The Ypsilanti Police Department and Ypsilanti City Attorney John Barr’s investigation into the ownership situation found that the two parties share the same attorney, Charles Frangie, which was not illegal.

    When reached on Thursday, Barr said he hadn’t heard the property was up for sale but would monitor the situation.

    Read more:
    http://www.mlive.com/business/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2014/02/real_estate_beat_history_of_sh.html

  28. Zaxxon
    Posted February 4, 2014 at 5:40 pm | Permalink

    I stopped in over the weekend to see if anything was new. I noticed they are carrying a lot better pornography. They’ve gone from Nugget to Swank.

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