The Korean community is seeing an increase in the number of businesses closings due to financial burdens, with more and more owners unable to shoulder the high costs of rents, utilities, and personnel expenses. The Flushing area has been especially hit with closings in this continued economic slump. Some closings have come as a surprise, since the businesses were thought to be "long-term survivors," having already weathered the difficult economy for over a decade, and having come to be seen as representative in the Korean business world. The complaints are fairly similar for all of them: decreasing sales income during the recession has made overhead costs unmanageable, eventually forcing them to close.

One such business is the Korean-owned Kummundo, a Korean-Chinese restaurant on Northern Blvd. in Flushing, which has been closed now for over three weeks. A sign on the front door says the restaurant is "closed for remodeling," but neighboring store owners say the restaurant's owner has given up his business. One of the neighbors said that it is very common to fall one or two months behind in rent, but that there are not many businesses that can really recover, when rents can be as high as $20,000 a month. High rent is the single greatest reason for the closings, he said.

Mokja Kolmok, which roughly translates as "corner food market," is a famous food street in Flushing where many Korean restaurants are lined up, reminiscent of an old village market street. Two of its most popular restaurants, Solbau and New York Banjom, which had both opened last June, were already closed by September. Both restaurants display signs that read: "under construction," but the business owners cannot be reached. Rumor has it that new businesses will set up in these locations.

Closings are not limited to the Mokja Kolmok area. Already last year, Magic Castle, the large Korean shopping mall in Flushing, started seeing store closings. This year, Hanwoochon, Pulhyanggi, and Issu Donkkass could not survive and closed their doors. All are very well-known area businesses, and all faced increasing difficulty in meeting rents. It seems likely that another very popular business, a staple of the community for over 20 years, will soon be closing its doors, for the same reasons.

"There have been recessions in the past, but they were not like this one; this number of business closings is something new," says Sonata Real Estate broker Anthony Hyun. "Our estimates show that rents have jumped to twice what they were six or seven years ago, and utility and personnel costs have spiked as well. At the same time, sales income, the backbone of any business, is 20 percent lower than it was before throughout Flushing. Many businesses simply cannot keep up, given this math."

This seems to be the present, and perhaps future, song for businesses on Northern Blvd. and in downtown Flushing: the long-term economic slump is playing the music of economic collapse.