People have always joked around saying if you see a newly opened Starbucks, Chipotle, or upscale [insert ethnic cuisine]in your area, ‘just know your rent is going to go up and you’ll see more people jogging on your street.’ 

They were just joking about what gentrification is: new developments to attract more wealthy people to displace poorer people by pushing them into areas without new developments. 

There is always some truth to every joke, and upon the first (and last) Chipotle location opening just 10 minutes away from my house, a lot of people who I was friends with told me the bad news: they had to move away due to a rising cost of living and getting priced out. 

Despite my hometown having a high Latin American population and there is an abundance of wonderful, Mexi-Cali food at affordable prices (looking at you, al pastor tacos), Chipotle thought it’d be a good idea to open a location. Even my high school history teacher pointed this out in a disgusted tone, because he knew this was just a form of gentrification and eventually lowering people’s access to traditional cuisines, slowly and surely replacing local places with chain restaurants that ‘take inspiration’ from local cuisines to cater towards a more Western palette. 

Needless to say, my local Chipotle location closed down less than five years later and that was the last we ever saw of it. It wasn’t missed too much since Alberto’s was up the street, anyway. 

Although this was one example of just a Chipotle, it becomes a bit more sinister when taking a look at the British chain restaurant, Pho, their gentrification attempts and how it’s present in the Global South. At least Chipotle never claimed to be authentic Mexican cuisine, just Mexican-inspired. 

In 2013, an authentically claimed inauthentic pho restaurant chain, called Pho, founded by Stephen and Juliette Wall, was faced with backlash after they tried to trademark the word ‘pho’ as intellectual property and threatened to sue a small actually Vietnamese owned business for having the word ‘pho’ in their name. 

After they released a statement, saying they were able to trademark the word ‘pho’ as their restaurant name and asking other businesses to refrain from using the name ‘Pho,’ allowing bigger and smaller already established Vietnamese restaurants a rename period. It was a feeble attempt in shutting down smaller Vietnamese businesses, as they later released a statement saying they wouldn’t be taking legal action against MoPho. 

Besides, if you’re in a city, there are other Vietnamese restaurants you can support instead of Pho. A new location opened in Norwich, and I highly advise people to go support Vietnam Pho on Dereham Road instead. 

These are two case examples of gentrification, but it’s a much deeper, systemic issue. 

Gentrification of food redefines what authenticity is through the gentrifier’s point of view. Food gentrifiers redefine already healthy, affordable foods into something completely unrecognisable and unaffordable to the local people, but it’s a good investment… as long as it attracts gentrifiers. It’s carefully sourced, a ‘healthier’ option compared to the original, just as a very convenient Marks and Spencer or Whole Foods opens up across the street, signalling that the neighbourhood is more ‘upscale.’ 

It isn’t limited to cities or boroughs across the United States and United Kingdom; it’s happening in Mexico as well. 

I was talking to one of my friends who has family down in Mexico City and has spent time there. 

He told me that locals are getting displaced more and more due to ‘digital nomads’ (immigrants) and ‘expats’ (or again, immigrants) taking advantage of the lower cost of living than in the Global North. Since a lot of white ‘expats’ have moved to Mexico City, the food has been catered towards them and it’s gotten more expensive. Meaning, it’s not as good as it used to be. And it displays inequalities of quality of life: while white immigrants are experiencing the ‘good’ life in Mexico, locals are desperate to not get displaced. 

Gentrification in real time is devastating to notice, because once you see it, you can’t unsee it. So the next time an upscale coffee shop opens, just know someone’s getting displaced. 

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