Where have all the Burners gone? Shops catering to Burning Man brace for slow season

https://sfstandard.com/2024/08/13/sf-businesses-burning-man-outfits-
potential-sales-slump/

For a certain type of San Francisco retailer, the frenzied weeks leading 
up to Burning Man can make or break an entire year.

Kimono Dave earns up to 40% of its sales leading up to the weeklong 
festival in the Nevada desert, which kicks off Aug. 25. The owner of the 
Mission’s Five and Diamond describes Burning Man as “our Christmas.” The 
merchandiser of Ceiba SF calls August “31 days of Black Friday,” adding, 
“This is when we make the majority of our budget.”

However, unusually slow ticket sales for this year’s gathering are fueling 
concern from shop owners about whether they’ll see their typical bounty.

“We’re about 20%, maybe 25% below normal,” said Uti, the mononymous woman 
who has run Piedmont Boutique at 1452 Haight St. for 52 years, stating 
proudly that she has “dressed Burners since the beginning.” She blames an 
overall economic crunch for both the slow sales of Burning Man tickets and 
her shop’s assortment of dazzling outfits.

“It’s not the spirit, it’s the pocketbook,” that’s waning, Uti said, 
watching visitors flip through racks of neon short-shorts and shiny 
bralettes. The shop’s seamstresses produce about 90% of its inventory of 
jewelry and clothing, Uti estimates, noting that her stockpile of 1980s-
era fabrics allows her team to create unique looks.

While she hasn’t seen this kind of dip in decades, she and other 
shopkeepers are taking heart in the fact that the biggest surge in sales 
typically comes 10 days before the festival, when out-of-towners fly to 
San Francisco to stock up ahead of their departure for the desert. 

“The store is running every single day, with longer hours, up ’til the 
Burn,” said Dave Carr, who founded the fuzzy-coat purveyor Kimono Dave at 
1681 Haight St. He and his team plan to hustle over the next few weeks to 
take advantage of what they hope is a rush, amid what has been a slower 
festival season overall.  

Marquee events like Coachella also grappled with slower sales, while 
Lucidity Festival and several musicians’ tours were canceled altogether. 

“This whole year has been a struggle,” Carr said. The lower festival 
attendance has affected sales for artists and designers who sell at or for 
them. “I’ve just seen a massive slip, personally, but also from the people 
around me.” 

Carr plans to attend Burning Man this year for the 15th time and said he’s 
optimistic that fewer attendees will create a more intimate experience. 
He’s also excited to encounter many of the people he has sold clothing to 
this year and before.

“The most rewarding thing in my entire life is seeing my work on the 
Playa,” he said.

‘Low expectations’ mix with hope
Aside from his shop, which peddles brightly colored faux fur, Carr shouts 
out other independent Haight Street designers, including Kayo and Tamo, 
that offer Burning Man-ready gear, from catsuits and hooded vests to 
pasties and crowns. Ceiba and Five and Diamond, meanwhile, trade heavily 
in leather and black or white options, either loose and flowing or 
extremely form-fitting “cage” wear. Dust masks and steampunk-style goggles 
make appearances across the board. 

For Burners who want to hand-craft their own outfits, Haight Street art 
store Mendels offers faux fur, rainbow nylon and festive trim. Owner Naomi 
Silverman said that the shop typically sees a bump in sales in the last 
few weeks of August, but that she’s not planning for it this year. “This 
summer hasn’t been as strong as some others,” she said. “That combined 
with low ticket sales for Burning Man leaves me with pretty low 
expectations.”

Like Kimono Dave and Mendels, Ceiba at 1364 Haight St. has seen diminished 
foot traffic all year, according to Anat, who has worked at the store for 
two decades and asked to withhold her last name for privacy reasons. 
Despite the slowdown, she believes the store’s loyal shoppers, who have 
been “religiously coming in for years,” will stop in before they leave for 
the Burn. 

Related
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“It comes in waves,” she said, noting that many international Burners will 
be landing in San Francisco in the coming week. “That’s what keeps us 
afloat.”

The shop sells one-of-a-kind and handmade pieces by independent designers, 
attracting a clientele willing to shell out in order to look and feel 
special. “We can have one person who comes in and spends $10,000 within 
two hours,” she said. 

Anat has been to Burning Man five times, and while she’s staying home this 
year, she loves that her interactions with Burners leading up to the event 
act as a portal to that world. A highlight for her this year was helping 
style the woman who designed the Temple, a structure known as “the soul of 
Burning Man.”

While Five and Diamond closed its permanent location on Valencia Street 
this year, the Burning Man buying spree is so important for the company 
that it’s popping up in the Mission for the month. 

Owner Haley Lynn said she realized how atypical the ticketing situation 
was when the Burning Man organization asked to sell tickets out of her 
shop. Last weekend was the first time since 2011 that the event has 
expanded beyond online ticketing to brick-and-mortar outlets in San 
Francisco and Reno, Nev. 

“We thought we’d have a line around the corner,” Lynn said, before she 
realized that tickets hadn’t sold out online. She estimates that the 
organization’s booth at the back of her store sold only a handful of $500+ 
tickets over the weekend. 

Five and Diamond has seen a steady stream of customers, but Lynn is 
crossing her fingers for a big surge over the weekend and early next week. 

She misses having a permanent anchor in San Francisco, which has also lost 
Burning Man mainstays Costumes on Haight and Distractions in recent years, 
and hopes people will show up to support local designers. 

“If you want to be in the true spirit of Burning Man, you should be 
supporting artists and shopping small, slow fashion, not on Amazon,” she 
said. “We’re all Burners — you’re supporting the community.” 


-- 
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