Asklemmy

Red Rooster. It's a national chain restaurant here in AU with outlets in every major city, you never see anyone in there and nobody knows anyone who eats there, but they never seem to have any trouble staying open.

Used to go to a night club that must have been up to something. The prices, both membership and drinks were so low it is either fake booze or another income. The drinks seemed fine.

Yup. Currently here in NZ, and there are a few almost-always-empty eateries that even survived COVID. Very sus overall haha.

Yes. It looks super dingy, and I've never seen anyone go in there.

But the main clincher is they had PS5's right up the height of their rarity. Super suspicious.

But it worked so I guess that's the main thing. I was half expecting him to ask if I wanted any drugs or a "new friend", but no.

There are several! It's kind of a problem in my city but none of the civilians care because somehow they have the best food

There's an arcade in the center of town beneath an expensive (yet shitty) apartment complex. The arcade windows are covered but there is a sign that says "Opening Soon". It's been two years and nothing has changed externally. At first I was giving them the benefit of the doubt, but the property is expensive to rent and after 2 year I have my doubts.

What I don't understand though is if you were using the place as a front, wouldn't an arcade be a great place to launder money while your at it?

The old pizza place used to be owned by a big drug dealer and you could rig up, order a special topping o. The top and you could get weed over the counter.

Then my local chicken fast food restaurant did the same but you got to go through the drive Thu.

They had to close it down and deep clean because they were selling everything lol.

There’s a medical supply store in my town I went in one time because my mom needed a crutch and everything was covered in dust. I went online and a bunch of people were saying that it’s just a front to commit insurance fraud.

Long John Silvers, of course.

We have a Mexican store here (one of several), but people come from ~90 miles to come to THIS one. None of the others in town, just this one. There’s a ton of others between here and there but this one is special. It’s not fake documents because I know other places that have those.

Not sure what they’re doing but they’re always busy and a ton of out of town/out of state people come and go.

I mean I live in Berlin...

Yep, we have really expensive fashion boutiques on the promenade where I live. Nobody seems to enter and shop there. Ever. There's usually a shopkeeper, female, who sits there all day, adjusting the clothes.

Not my town, but there is a junk shop in main railway station, (sells clothing, shit like t-shirts with weed prints, pipes, random little trinkets). I can only assume rent is very expensive in such a central location, and I really can't think of any way how that place is profitable. I only visited once as a teen since they sold us weed pipes even though I was underage. -There is a actual tobacco shop nearby, with much better selection. -There is never any customers -None of the products sold are very valuable, so they would have to sell lot of them to make profit -If you really wanted to buy cringe t-shirt, there is many shops for that around as well, all of which are well known compared to this one

Many business have gone under during the years in that location, replaced with others, but somehow this one place has been there over 10 years.

I have a vacuum repair shop in an old warehouse building a couple blocks from me. It has almost no signage except a neon "open" sign sand a small "vacuum repair" sign on the door. I have never seen anyone walking in there

There's a restaurant in my hometown of Lexington, KY called ""Frank and Dino's." It's owned by Carlo Baccarezza who has ties John Gotti, who was Italian mafia. He's a horrible person and has been sued by former employees of the restaurant for discrimination.

He opened this place just before the pandemic. It's supposed to be a fine-ish dining establishment with authentic Italian. The prices are high, but the food is terrible. It might be passable for someone who doesn't know authentic Italian. In any case, the restaurant sits empty most of the day, and it doesn't make sense to me why you would open a place like this and just allow it to have a terrible reputation that's mostly empty day in and day out.

There's a car repair shop that is basically just a private garage, no sign, no ads, but on the regular, you see brand new, expensive cars with license plates from far away being "fixed" there. Always only takes an hour tops.

There is also a known drug dealing hot spot on the car park across the road of the car shop.

There is a person who sells bags on my high street. He has some cheap chiness watches up front, and actually uses the shop to sell fake watches (which is illegal, duh). I am 100% sure of it because I was going to buy one (but then I decided I would be too ashamed to wear a fake watch).

Also potentially a "tech" shop. Everything was so expensive, I've never seen people enter or leave, and when I asked about a device, they didn't evsn know the spscs for it. How the hell are you selling a computer if you don't know the specs for it? And why would a 32GB USB cost £12? Seems a bit much.

Nice try, FBI.

Mattress firm

At one point in Toronto I counted 10, yes ten, perfume shops on Yonge St from bloor to Dundas. I swear one of the shelves in one of them would have to be a secret door.

We live across a back alley from a hookah bar that was called "A Buck R 2 Lounge". There's a shed in the back where all sorts of ATVs and dirt bikes meet up to terrorize the neighborhood/city, it sounds like we live in the middle of a motocross course. They recently painted the building black with purple trim (as hideous as it sounds) and put a new sign up proclaiming the establishment is now called "Rico's Rush". I wish someone would just burn the place down already, starting with the shed...

In the town I live in one of the worst kept secrets is a small hundred year old mixed use 2 or 3 story building. The Laundromat at the bottom with a handful of old washing machines and dryers is always locked and never actually open. Former tenants have publicly stated it's purely a front because the landlord doesn't want to bother with a commercial tenant but because of the zoning it needs a commercial space on the ground level so they maintain a fake laundromat

It's been many years since I was there but there's a ski shop in Gainesville Florida.

Lots of massage parlors I'm sure are front for sexytime places.

I'm convinced that calzones aren't real, and any place claiming to sell them is a front.

Every psychic in NYC