• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

David Degner

Boston Photographer and Photojournalist

  • editorial
  • commercial
  • portrait
  • about

Boston Business Struggles in Pandemic

Photography of Boston's iconic restaurant...a Dunkin' Donuts.

Downtown Boston, the heart of New England’s largest city typically pulses with office workers, tourists and shoppers. Since the coronavirus pandemic struck–canceling vacations and clearing out office towers–once-bustling weekdays feel more like sleepy Sundays.

“Most buildings are not able to crack 7%” occupancy, said Rosemarie Sansone, chief executive of the Downtown Boston Business Improvement District, or BID, a 34-block area in Boston’s core normally teeming with office workers.

-Published in the Wall Street Journal

 Portrait of Ferguson Herivaux in his store "One Gig"

One Gig Chief Executive Ferguson Herivaux in the skateboard and streetwear shop. Sales have been strong at One Gig, which reopened in early June.

One Gig, a streetwear and skateboard shop, opened its new two-story, 4,000-square-foot location on March 2, after five years in a much smaller basement space around the corner. It temporarily shut operations 20 days later in response to state orders, then reopened in early June, initially for pickups and appointments only.

One of a series of portraits for this story.

A portrait of Levent Berksan in his shuttered Cafe De Boston on December in Boston, Massachusetts.

Levent Berksan has kept his Café de Boston restaurant closed since the pandemic hit because he relies so heavily on downtown workers. The marketplace eatery occupies a large space on the ground floor of two connected office buildings that are now mostly empty, he said.

“Our biggest strength is our biggest weakness right now,” Mr. Berksan said, of his office-based customers. “We put all our eggs in one basket, and we lost all of the eggs.”

The restaurant grossed $2.7 million last year on about 1,000 customers a day, plus an office-catering business that has also dried up. The cafe can’t break even when business drops more than 25%, he said, noting that a break on rent has allowed him to stay in hibernation until customers return.

Buildings of downtown Boston are reflected in the Millennium Tower in Boston, Massachusetts.
Brattle Book Shop

Kenneth Gloss, co-owner with his wife, Joyce Kosofsky, of Brattle Book Shop, reopened in early June, as soon as he could. His family has owned the three-story antiquarian bookstore for 71 of its 195 years. “Our goal this year is not to lose too much money,” he said.

Normally, the bookshop would be bustling in December, with holiday shoppers and families taking in “The Nutcracker” and other special events. But sales, already down 40% for much of the year, fell further this holiday season in comparison with previous years. “A lot of the regulars just aren’t here,” Mr. Gloss said.

Stephanie Horn of Boston Diamond Company

When the pandemic temporarily shut down the Boston Diamond Company, Stephanie Horn’s business on Washington Street, she worried it could be a fatal blow. “The rent is really expensive in Downtown Crossing,” she said.

The 400-square-foot jewelry shop has managed to hang in there, even without pop-in visits from local office workers and tourists. Ms. Horn has been buoyed by referrals while taking customers to the small shop on an appointment-only basis to avoid crowding.

Emerson Paramount Center

New H-1B Visa Rules Are Unaffordable

Tech Startups Say New H-1B Visas Rules Are Unaffordable

FRAMINGHAM, MASSACHUSETTS – OCTOBER 29: An empty desk in the Bridge12 lab on October 29, 2020 in Framingham, Massachusetts. Bridge12 Technologies with Jagadishwar Sirigiri develops terahertz (THz) technology for magnetic resonance. (Photo by David Degner/Wall Street Journal)

Published in the Wall Street Journal

New rules from the Trump administration restricting skilled foreign workers are unnerving U.S. startup hubs, as founders and investors say the limitations will hamstring their ability to recruit top-tier talent to grow their businesses.

Ethan Bossange, Process Engineer, and Maurcie Black, CEO, put on safety equipment when entering their lab on October 29, 2020 in Lowell, Massachusetts. Advanced Silicon Group is a medical technology startup developing sensors in the M2D2 incubator. (Photo by David Degner/Wall Street Journal)
Andres Canales, Senior Lab Engineer, holds a prototype sensor reader at Advanced Silicon Group a medical technology startup developing sensors in the M2D2 incubator.
Jagadishwar Sirigiri received approval for three H-1B applicants to join his Massachusetts-based company just weeks before the new wage rules took effect.
Renuka Rajkumar, who has an H-1B visa, works for Bridge12 Technologies in Framingham, Mass.

Sustainable Lobster Fishing?

Sustainable Lobster Fishing in Maine

Fifth generation Mainer lobsterman Kelly Wallace, 28, is scared. Not only is the sustainability of Maine’s lobster fishery endangered, so too is that of those iconic fishing villages dotting coastal and island harbors. Ask marine research scientists about the sustainability of Maine’s fisheries, especially that of the state’s iconic American lobster, and the responses cover climate change and warming ocean waters. Ask Maine lobstermen (and that term includes women), and the reply is often less about climate and more about preserving community, limiting regulations, sourcing bait, and protecting waterfront access.

Say Maine, and most conjure that calendar-cover image of the granite-girdled coast: A cozy harbor edged with ramshackle fishing wharves topped with lobster traps and bait barrels; lobster boats and colorful buoys bobbing in rippling waters; and spruce-trimmed islands salting the panorama. All that’s missing are a few salty characters with accents thicker than fish chowder. That’s exactly the view from McLoon’s Lobster, a traditional Maine lobster shack just south of Rockland, in midcoast Maine. Order at the window, settle at a picnic table with friends or family…

-Words by Hilary Nangle

On the Lobster Boat

To reach Tenant’s Harbour I drive more than three hours, about half way up Maine’s coast. If I were to continue another three hours I would be in Canada. To get to the lobsters I join Jason, the captain, and Ethan, the sternman, on the docks before sunrise.

We take their boat through an hour of chop to an uninhabited island that Jason says is in his family so they can easily sink their traps there. We find the first distinctive blue and white buoy and the two get to work. Hauling up the traps, lining them up on the railing, throwing out any seaweed or debris inside, fishing out any lobsters, refilling the traps with bait, and throwing them back in the water. It’s a very physical process, the weather is slightly above freezing, waves hit the face, lobster claws close to the numb fingers, the traps are weighted with concrete and the lines attaching them together can easily get wrapped around a leg.

It’s winter so the lobsters are mainly out in deeper waters and the catch is small, but the price per pound is high. At the end of the day we hear a call out over the radio that the stock market is crashing and the price of lobster has also dropped $1. A quick recalculation and it is obvious that the day’s work is no longer profitable, and with the price of bait and gas, Jason will be paying to catch lobsters that day. We find the last buoy, empty the traps and head back in.

The day’s catch is left at the weighing station and I hop in my car to warm up. The two take their boat back out into the bay to anchor waiting for the traps to do their thing and catch more lobsters.

Story and cover photo commissioned by Sandwich Magazine.

Footer

  • David@DavidDegner.com
  • +1-646-450-4334
  • Boston, MA
  • Instagram
  • Blog
  • Photojournalism
  • Portrait Photography
  • Commercial Photography

I'm a freelance photographer in Boston, working on editorial, commercial, and personal projects.