Becca Kanik and two friends arrived at the wrong location last weekend. They’d intended to visit the boutique post.script. in Lower Pacific Heights but had accidentally sent their Uber to the coffee shop Postscript in Jackson Square.
The former sells vibrantly colored items like glassware, cards, and candles; the latter has styled itself like luxury grocer Erewhon or a European market, proffering coffee, fresh and pre-packaged food, and goods like ceramic dishes, cookbooks, and, yes, candles.
Quickly realizing their mistake, the women called another car to take them to California Street. But this wasn’t an isolated incident. It’s just the latest in a series of screw-ups that have plagued post.script. owner Chandler Tang in the year and a half since the similar-sounding coffee shop opened.
For Tang, the mistaken identity issue has spiraled into a protracted and exasperating ordeal that is a case study in how online search results can confuse rather than clarify. She just published a petition that aims to pressure the other Postscript to either change its name (a scenario she admits is unlikely) or stop selling certain categories of products.
“Our image and reputation is out of our hands because of the similar names,” she said. “We feel like we’re being erased.”
Tang first became aware of the other shop when she started getting tags and comments on social media about coffee and smoothies. Her confusion morphed into consternation when she visited the other Postscript and saw that, in addition to coffee and food, it sold product categories that fell under her business’s trademark, like books and homegoods.
She hired a lawyer to send a cease-and-desist letter to the cafe, which is owned by Gina and Stuart Peterson. Months of back-and-forth emails between lawyers that “hasn’t produced a firm, acceptable agreement” led Tang to pen her petition.
Tang sees the name distraction as the latest challenge in a city where it’s already hard to survive as a small business. From her perspective, she’s up against a bigger, better-funded shop that’s failing to respect her work and intellectual property, while causing increasing customer confusion.
But from the cafe’s perspective, Tang is in the wrong, because her shop sells chocolate, which falls under Postscript’s own trademark, which includes food. Gina Peterson said that her cafe is “hesitant” to take action about that trademark issue because it would like to support Tang’s business.
“It’s not easy operating a small business in the Bay Area and we each need to lift each other up and be as supportive as possible whenever possible,” she said via email. “Especially so for female founders.”
Instead of embracing that women-against-the-world dynamic, Tang views the situation as a David versus Goliath battle. An early news report about Postscript’s impending opening said Stuart Peterson’s venture capital firm, Artis Ventures, provided funding for the cafe. Postscript denied that to The Chronicle, which previously reported on the name confusion.
The couple purchased the Jackson Square building where Postscript (and Artis Ventures) are located for $15 million in 2017, live in a Tiburon estate with a “magical garden,” and are active in the SF art world, where Gina is an SF MoMA trustee. In 2022, the duo sold their New York City condo for $16.5 million, reportedly so that they could move into a West Village townhouse that they purchased for $27.5 million and renovated.
To Tang, the scale of the Petersons’ resources means that Postscript should be the one to make concessions on what it’s selling. She also argues that because her seasonal chocolate and toffee sales predate the cafe, they could be exempt from the trademark battle.
Tang said she’s fielded many confused callers asking about food deliveries or coffee bean returns. Once, Tang even dealt with a milk delivery mix-up (she had to explain the other location to a delivery driver who parked his truck outside her shop).
Meanwhile, she’s noticed that her shop’s search results have been demoted. Adding to the problem, Google’s AI-powered search results can spit out a mix of information from each shop if a user inputs certain queries.
“We’re a small business that doesn’t have substantial funding for ads or SEO,” she said, adding that she believes that the future of her shop and thus her livelihood is on the line: “I am heartbroken that the small business I’ve dreamed about my whole life is in danger.”
“This isn’t just about us,” she wrote in her petition. “It’s about protecting small, independent businesses from being overshadowed by well-funded businesses.”