Astoria Cafe’s Instagram Post About Fire Sparks Controversy

ASTORIA, QUEENS — After a dryer fire started at an Astoria laundromat on Tuesday, a neighboring cafe’s Instagram post sparked controversy among locals.

“Safe to say according to locals & hooked customers, New York’s very first loukoumades shop is FIRE,” Gold N Honey — a cafe on 25th and Ditmars that sells Greek donuts with a twist — captioned a photo they posted of the front of their shop lit up by the lights of a fire truck, which was called to respond to the fire at Mr. Cleaner’s Laundromat next door.

The post received more comments than any other Instagram post Gold N Honey has made — half of the commenters criticized the caption, and the other half came to the business’s defense.

One user called the post “distasteful,” and another, who said they work in PR, went as far as calling the promotion tactic “disgusting.” A third wrote: “It's incredibly short-sighted to make light of a traumatic situation for a fellow local business that suffered from a real fire this evening.”

But, many others came out in defense of the cafe.

“Some of you need to sweeten up and eat some loukoumades,” commented one user, who encouraged people to read other comments on the post that explain how Gold N Honey actually helped Mr. Cleaner’s Laundromat during the fire.

Several local businesses also commented words of encouragement on the post, including Piu Bella Pizza in Astoria, who wrote that it’s “great to see such a strong support system in Astoria” of businesses supporting each other.

Nicholas Constantinou, the owner of Mr. Cleaner’s Laundromat, told Patch that the post “was taken out of context. The guys next door were actually very helpful during the fire. They came by and offered to help give me a hand,” he said, adding that dryer fires like the one on Tuesday are “part of the game for me” as someone who operates a laundromat.

Gold N Honey, explained in a written message to Patch that they went over to help their neighbors after seeing smoke, and “treated the FDNY to loukoumades and coffee to thank them for their quick response” after the fire was put out. “We love and support all of our neighbors,” Gold N Honey wrote.

They added: “We thought the fire truck in front of our store with the illuminating lights looked beautiful and we have family and friends in the FDNY. So we posted it because everyone keeps saying ‘your loukoumades are fire.’”

Constantinou agrees: “They’re very good, I have them daily,” he said of the loukoumades.