Modern Times

10/24/2026

Hello,
A couple house keeping items.
1. We’ve run through a ton of merch! We will keep producing merch until the second week of December. After that Modern Times merch will be Done! We will try to print requests from our archives. Message us.

2. We will be changing to a hand written menu in the coming week, and for the sake of our staff be resuming tips until we close.

3. We will have a burger night slash hot sauce sale in the middle of November, and our last craft sale/ burger night in the first half of December.

3. ATTN. Artists! We will be having an open art show and auction for the cafe in December. If you are interested in participating email us @gmail.com.
Thank you everyone.

3. We will be posting a calendar of events and food specials soon. If people have any favorites please let us know and we will try and squeeze them all in. I will write a cookbook in some form next year.

4. We will be having some bands playing in December and a final party TBA. We will accept playlists for the last month of service if people are interested.

5. Merch coming soon!
We are getting primary color design black pocket t’s this week. Primary hoodies, and sweatpants in the next 2. Classic cat t-shirts in various color prints this week. Camo beanies in stock. White classic mugs in stock. Black classic mugs this week! 69 tears sweatsuits next month. We are trying our best to keep up. Thank you everyone for your support.
Modern Times forever

10/17/2026

For the last 6 years, I’ve been trying to prove that Modern Times can continue to exist. I’ve exhausted every option without compromising the core fundamentals that make Modern Times what it is.

Because of this, we have made the choice to close at the end of the year. This has been an incredibly difficult decision and one that did not come lightly. I announce this decision now, with the hope that we can spend the next two plus months celebrating the nearly 16 years that Modern Times has stood for creativity over cost, kindness over profit, and uncompromising values as a business in this country.

This coming week I’ll start to explain how we got to this point and what the next couple months will look like. The only way for places like Modern Times to exist in the future is to actively challenge the reasons why it can no longer exist.

Forever Modern Times,
Dylan

10/14/2026

If you were in Monday, you might have noticed that we fed Phil. Phil Rosenthal. We’ve had alot of cameras and crew in Modern Times over the past year. Phil and team were #1. Thanks for taking the time, and making. That time memorable for our crew and customers.

10/13/2026

🧶ART 🦆
We have new art up for the month of October, come see Jesse Quam’s black and white prints and one painting (with color)! We’re enjoying this playful work
On display from October 6th- November 4th
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Jesse Quam

10/11/2026

Some photos from Monty Montgomery over the years 2011 and beyond!

10/10/2026

Ad from from 2012 Darah Lundberg. We are open 9-3 everyday!

10/08/2026

10/05/2026

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/10/04/podcasts/the-daily/the-restaurant-industry-is-broken-can-it-be-fixed.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share.

Hello. On Sunday, 10/4, the NYT podcast, The Daily, featured some excerpts and ideas about the restaurant industry, as reported by Brett Anderson.
The podcast included excellent reporting and ended by talking about future remediation strategies.
Before we can start talking about solutions, we have to jointly identify that the for-profit model for small businesses in this country is broken. Inflation has not settled since the pandemic. The conveniences that were portrayed as short cuts and solutions for small business owners now also cost more than they are worth. Businesses cannot even afford labor. Ask your favorite small business how they are doing.
Happy Monday!

10/04/2026

The “Cabbie” breakfast sandwich is named after a couple of legendary cab drivers from 2012, Mike,Jeff and Jim French (rip). Our city is making way for driverless “cabs”. First they came for our cab drivers and now they are coming for ride share drivers. Two generations of drivers are watching their jobs be replaced by technology. Our city is welcoming this idea and I have to ask myself - do robots each sandwiches?

10/02/2026

A great employee art show, Moon Palace books family, Darah, Clint and my dad putting the Modern Sign back up, and a blurry customer photo of me in the first year. These things feel impossible to express the amount of hands went into making this space what it is. The iconic Modern sign was in a pile in the basement when we first toured 3200 Chicago Ave. The Art Deco facade had a shadow left from sun bleaching around where the sign once hung, old painted over glue above the entrance said “times”. We had a name. Lauren Roche Darah Lundberg Moon Palace Books tynan kerr Crispy Fur Andrew Mazorol