The South Shore Press - February 21, 2024
Members of the Damianos Family, owners of commercial priorities throughout Long Island, presented their next project to the Chamber of Commerce of Mastic and Shirley—a new Starbucks at their Floyd Harbor Shopping Center in Shirley.
The 1,800-square-foot coffee shop will be built near the Montauk Highway entrance of the center, which is also home to Applebees, Harbor Freight, and Aldi’s supermarket. The new building is permitted by town code on the commercial property, and the developers, Damianos Realty Group, are looking to secure site plan approval for the construction. It will be the subject of a Brookhaven Town Planning Board hearing on February 21.
This will be the first Starbucks in the Mastic-Shirley area, with the nearest locations of the popular coffee houses in Manorville and Patchogue. The chain, which started in Seattle in 1971, serves millions of customers each week and is part of the fabric of tens of thousands of neighborhoods all around the world, the publicly traded company reports.
“We’re very community-minded people looking to attract the types of businesses that people in the area desire,” said Pelops Damianos, who attended the chamber meeting with his brother, Cris.
“The new building pulls inspiration from the existing shopping center while creating a look of its own,” said X Cris Damianos, Jr., the developer’s son, who is the project architect. “It will be different from the typical cookie-cutter type Starbucks you usually see.”
“We’re excited about Starbucks coming here,” said April Coppola, a chamber member. “We’ve wanted a Starbucks here forever,” said Beth Wahl, another member. “I love their Frappuccinos, and now I’ll be able to get them without having to go far away.” While many of the chamber members were receptive to the project, President Frank Montenez said the group will vote on the matter before taking a formal position.
The Damianos Realty Group was started by Dr. Xenophon Damianos, a family practitioner practicing in Stony Brook who built his first office for himself and other doctors. He constructed more offices and nursing homes in other areas and expanded to nursing homes to serve the county’s growing population. Now managed by his sons, the company has many other buildings throughout Suffolk.
“The most important thing for a shopping center owner is the community,” Cris Damianos said. “We recognize that an area can prosper or suffer by the condition of its shopping center. A quality center benefits the community as well as the owner.”
“They have a well-deserved reputation for taking good care of their properties,” said a resident who lives near the company’s Center Moriches Square Shopping Center, which is anchored by King Kullen on Main Street. “The center is very clean with great landscaping. They are good neighbors.”
By Robert Chartuk