Free Things To do in New York City! -With Rebeka Getty

0:00This episode of The New Yorker's Podcast is brought to you by NewYork100.org, recognizing excellence across New York City's five boroughs. Hello, everyone, and welcome to The New Yorker's, the podcast by New York City Cop. I am your host, Kelly Copp, published photographer, New York City tour business owner, real estate content creator, podcaster, and above all else, a New Yorker. Ladies and gentlemen, the next book looks about, Tracy, now, five. Stand clear of the closing doors, please.

0:45This is Time Square.

1:04With me today, I have Rebecca Getty. She is the founder of NYC for Free, the go-to source for free pop-ups, events, and things to do in New York City. But above all else, she is a New Yorker. Hey, Rebecca. Welcome to the show. How are you today? Hey, Kelly. I'm good. How are you? I'm good. Just running around New York City today like I always do. On this hot day today, too. Beautiful day. It's a beautiful day. It's been better than it has been. So we're happy about that. It's been it's been like crazy hot the last couple of weeks. Yeah, it's been a very hot summer, but I heard there might be an early fall.

1:38So I guess we just have to enjoy the nice weather while it lasts. Oh, I'm so excited that you said that. Fall. Oh, I think it's one of my favorite seasons in the city. I think me too. It's become that way. Oh, it's incredible. So, Rebecca, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself? You know, where you were you born? You know, where you're from? Just tell us how you arrived to where you are today. Yeah. So I can't say I was born in New York. I was born in Long Island, but my mom's from Queens. My dad's from Brooklyn. Family all lives in the New York City area. So I kind of grew up going here very often as a kid to see family, to see Broadway shows and everything.

2:14You are a New Yorker to me. I know. I know. But I always feel like I have to caveat that I wasn't born here. You know what I mean? But I've lived here for quite a while. You know, after college, moved to New York City in my own apartment and started my account a couple of years after I graduated college when I was kind of, you know, bored of doing the typical thing in New York and was always giving recommendations to all of my friends on free things to do in New York City. So you started your NYC for free account, you said. You just decided to come up. Tell us how you decided to come up with it and why.

2:48Yeah, I feel like I was always giving recommendations to my co-workers, to my friends on things to do in New York City. And my manager at the time who was traveling in for work was like, you know, you should start a blog. You always tell me every weekend all the things I should be doing. And this was probably 2017. And I was like, no, I don't want to start a blog. And then I guess a couple years later, the idea was marinating. And I was like, you know what? I'm going to start an Instagram because I think people are interested in the type of information I'm finding. And I was having a hard time finding that information on free events in one source.

3:24So I was like, let me become that source. And so I started my account in 2019. And that's crazy. It's been six years. So smart. You know, do you, you know, so you started this, your page NYC for free right before the pandemic. how do you feel the pandemic affected your account um do you feel like it helped you know ironically or do you feel like it hurt you know giving out free information or all this awesome information about New York City yeah it was weird so I started my account in August so I think I had like you know eight months before the pandemic was growing it it was pretty small and then COVID hit And I was like, hmm, I should post free online events because everyone's home.

4:08Everyone's bored. I was bored. So then I started finding all these things like there was free cooking classes. There was like a day of free workouts. There was live performances like on Instagram live. And so I just started, you know, doing what I always did, but just sharing things only online. And then I think that kept my account, you know, like still relevant. Right. And then after COVID, I found that like experiential marketing really took off. And that's when my account grew along with that. When brands were starting to put their money towards, you know, having in-person events versus like a billboard ad or things like that.

4:45Right. Wow, that's really interesting. Yeah. Because, you know, I don't even remember how I did my page during the pandemic because I did leave for a while, too. I mean, you're from New York, so you're going home. So, no, I did not go home. I didn't go to my parents. We had just moved the week before COVID. And we had moved from a one bedroom with a fake window, kind of like a flex one bedroom, to having a real window. So we thought our apartment was so big. We were so happy to quarantine there. So I stayed in the city the entire time. Wow. But I didn't like it, but I didn't hate it. Right. We went running on the West Side Highway.

5:22We had so many picnics, like distance from my friends in the park. I don't remember it personally. I remember it, you know, it wasn't the worst. Like we made do, I baked a lot of bread. Right. Yeah. Were you, you know, I was gone in Florida and North Carolina for, you know, part of the pandemic to my family and friends. And, you know, do you remember if, you know, were we allowed to go outside? I wasn't here. Yeah. It was, I mean, like the first like week or so, maybe it was kind of crazy, but we were, we were allowed to. I mean, I was outside a lot. I feel like I went on a lot of walks. That's interesting.

5:59Jay, I'm going to ask you real quick. What about you? Do you remember what you did? I didn't expect the segue to go to, but it's interesting for a second to hear. What did you do? So I was about to turn 21. It was like three days before my 21st birthday. And I was finishing up my junior year in college. and I had just gotten into a groove and was doing well in school and I had internships and I had a job and I was working and all of a sudden it just kind of went away so um we had to like leave campus we had to like go to zoom classes and I ended up going back home to my parents house in Westchester um and ended up spending the next like year and a half with my parents in Westchester so interesting yeah you know i just yeah you know i feel like everyone has a covet story like what did we do what were you doing when covet yeah yeah well i feel like it was beneficial for you ironically rebecca because you know i think that's really smart about the online classes because i hadn't thought about that either yeah we need a ways to fill our time you know that's that kept you current and interesting yeah you know so that that's that's brilliant that's really smart.

7:13So Rebecca, in addition to what you did online during the pandemic and now what you do in addition, you know, every day on NYC for free on your social media, do you do anything else for information to give to people? So once I went full time with this, I'm like, I need to do more. So I have my Instagram, TikTok, obviously social media, but I have a website where I have a calendar of events. And then I have a weekly newsletter that I send out every Wednesday morning with like 30 free things to do for that upcoming week. Which I subscribe to. Love that. And I love it. Every weekend I look at that newsletter and that's how I kind of gauge what I'm doing for the weekend too.

7:52Yeah, it's helpful. There's so many events to choose from. So I find that having that like curation aspect is helpful because it can be a bit overwhelming. So do you do this by yourself or do you have a team or? I'm pretty much a one woman show. Yeah. I'm seriously blown away right now. Yeah, I have a few people that like I trust that if there are five events going on at the same time, they can film for me. But in terms of I make every single video on my account, I do my website, my newsletter, all those socials. I work a lot, probably like more than most people think or most jobs even, but I love it.

8:29So that's amazing because here I am, you know, a little bit older than you, quite a bit older than you. And I'm like making one post that takes me like an hour with, you know, just the music and trying to edit it. And I'm like, oh, my gosh. It's not bad. I don't know. I just it's a lot, you know, for me just to walk around the city, too. You know, I'm exhausted. Yeah. You know, and you have a lot more added on to what you do. When's your birthday? Oh, it's actually coming up August 17th. Leo. Yes, you too? Oh, my. When's your birthday? When's your birthday? July 23rd. What's yours? March 23rd.

9:07Yeah, yeah. We're all fire. Fire. Oh, yeah. Not that I really get into it. See, it's so Leo of me. I don't know anything about any signs besides Leo. You're all. Yeah, that's such a Leo thing. It is. I recognize it. I mean, I kind of enjoy, you know, talking about what sign people are, you know. You know you're rising and all that stuff? Oh, I don't know all that stuff. I just like, whatever. And then like the one sentence blurb in the paper, in the newspaper when we were younger, you know. But it's kind of interesting to hear. There's a little bit of funness to it. It does kind of follow some personality traits.

9:39I think so. You know, not that I would base my, you know, I would bet on it, you know. But I think it's kind of fun and interesting. So, Rebecca, what's one free NYC experience that you think most New Yorkers don't even know exists? It's interesting. I think with social media secrets or things like that are kind of harder to have. All the hidden gems have all been uncovered by someone or another. So I kind of think about like what spots in the city do I go to that aren't normally crowded. And like, for example, there's the Pier 57 rooftop. That's a really nice rooftop. And every single time I go, there's really no one there.

10:20Correct. To me, that's still, although I've made videos on it and people know about it, it's still a little bit more of like a secret-ish spot. Can you just go up there on any day? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's any day you can, you know, bring a blanket. It's really nice. And they have a food hall underneath. So if you wanted to buy food. What did you say? I'm sorry. There's a food hall, the Pier 57 food hall. Oh, yes. Yeah. So that's nice. But you can buy food there. You can take food in your bag and just sit up there and watch, you know, the sunset. Rebecca, where is Pier 57? So Pier 57 is on the West Side Highway, so by the Hudson River in lower Manhattan.

10:57It's kind of by, you know, the Chelsea Market area around like 14th Street, give or take. And the views are so pretty there. Yeah, it's beautiful. Looking over Little Island. And they had fireworks for the 4th of July there last year. But obviously they switched it to the East River on the side. But I went there. Oh, that's right. Yeah, it was so nice when it was like the fireworks. And there was a big party there. And that just kind of made me realize how empty it can be at other times. Oh, wow. That's what a great spot. I would have never thought of that. So they do it again with the fireworks.

11:25That's the place to be. That's a great spot. I love that. So, Rebecca, can you share a story about the most unexpected or jaw-dropping free event you've ever stumbled upon? Yeah. So I always say one of my favorite free events that I went to was Ed Sheeran did a pop-up. and, you know, no one really like thought he was going to come or knew necessarily. But all of a sudden it was on, I think it was Green Street or Crosby Street, but a Soho cobblestone street. He drives up in his car. It's packed with people. He gets up, stands on his car and does like an impromptu performance. And, you know, New York was just standing there watching him.

12:06Right. It was very magical. It felt like a New York City moment. And it turns out, I think it was when he won his lawsuit or something. So he was in a good mood. I don't think he had plans to perform necessarily, but he just started singing a couple songs. And it was it was really cool. Did you know about ahead of time or you just happened to be there? It's funny. I didn't know that was happening. I knew about the pop up. And then, you know, sometimes I get like loose tips or like, oh, like come around this time. And I was like, OK, I'm going to come around this time. But I didn't know he was performing or that he was going to be there.

12:40I just was told to come. But, you know, I think for everyone else who was there and then he ended up handing out free tickets to his concert that day. How cool. Or that weekend. I'd love to see him at concerts. It was really cool. You know what was really cool, too, that I saw on your page yesterday, which is I feel like might be another jaw-dropping moment, was the Jonas Brothers. Oh, yeah. Can you tell us about that? So, that one. Did you see that, Jay? I saw that it happened, but I didn't see it. How cool. I ended up knowing in advance for that. not no one told me i got i think i went to a jonas brothers concert like six years ago and i get their text but i'm not like i'm not i like them i wouldn't consider myself like a huge like fan that would be so in the loop jay goes bonkers over there you love the jonas brothers yeah totally so i end up i end up getting this text at like 10 a.m being like come to the ferry 130 like first 200 people and i'm like oh my god i have to share this like i'm not gonna like and And so sometimes with those concerts, like I can't go to everything.

13:41So I will kind of crowdsource the content. So I saw someone else went and they let me use their video with permission. And yeah, it looks very cool. Yeah, it was really cool. I was thinking, gosh, I take the ferry a lot. I wish I would have happened to be there that day. The free concerts. So like one of my favorite things are the free concerts in the subway, in Times Square, in the ferry. And a lot of the times you just end up like lucking out. For example, there was a Bad Bunny, Jimmy Fallon concert in the fair. How cool would that have been? Oh, my God. I wish I would have been there. But what I do end up always going to are the Times Square concerts and a billboard.

14:18And those, they tend to like people find out maybe like an hour or two beforehand somehow. And there's this giant billboard. All of a sudden, you know, Shakira, Post Malone. I was there for that one. Just pops out of the billboard and you're like, whoa. It was really cool. Yeah, it's amazing. And then I saw the brat girl there. Oh, Charlie XPS. Love her. I don't know. I was there for that one. But you know, I'd never heard of her, you know. Rock Summer last year? No. Yeah, I'm just a little older, you know. So, but I loved her music. I'm like, this girl rocks. She's so talented. She was really good.

14:50And I was really fortunate too. This is before the pandemic. I caught Jimmy Fallon and Alanis Morissette in Rockefeller Center downstairs. They did a concert there? Yeah, in the subway area. Was it around Jagged Little Pill when her musical came out? That was on As Mores, though, right? I can't remember specifically. Yes, I think so. So I saw that show the day, the last day Broadway, like before Broadway closed during COVID. So that timing aligned pretty well. I think that's it. That's it. That was a really good Broadway show. Oh, my gosh. And it was so cool because they had their disguises on.

15:21It was like for Christmas time. And I was walking by and I saw them putting lights, like some people doing construction, putting some lights on the ceiling. And I was like, oh, this looks like something's going to happen. I'm going to stick around. You know? And so I stayed for a few hours. And it was worth it because I was right up front. I got a great video. On Facebook, it went viral. It was awesome. I can't remember if I put it on Instagram. But I actually just saw it the other day and my Facebook had popped up. But it was really cool. Those moments are crazy because you can plan them to some extent if you kind of get a tip or something, which happens a lot.

15:57But sometimes you completely luck out. Like sometimes I say that free events find me. like I was last year I was supposed to go to a doctor's appointment and I was too late because I'm always running late so my doctor canceled me but I was really mad at myself because I'm like oh I'm late to everything so then I was like I'm just gonna walk like clear my head all of a sudden I walk in Times Square and there was literally a free Gwen Stefani concert happening and I didn't know about it and it wasn't like the big Times Square when it was like I think like a stock company like hired her so but I was just walking and I was like what are the odds like I'm here now it's all meant to be like this was great I went to the doctor the next day but I just feel like sometimes when you are always looking for like things to do New York City free things like things kind of just find you which I completely agree yeah and even on a smaller scale for when I'm walking around the city and you know things just kind of transpire in front of you like this beautiful scene say you're just doing like you know for me like a quick little video of the city Yeah.

16:57Just the way everything comes together in the video, like cue the lady with the baby carriage walking by someone jogging, you know, somebody walking a couple of dogs all in the scene, you know, and in the Chrysler building. It's just kind of just transpires right in front of you. And they're not planned, just little moments like New York City moments, which are really cool. You know, I love that. romanticizing New York. Yes, exactly. So Rebecca, how do you actually find these events? Do you have a system sources or is it more about instinct and curiosity? Yeah. So I like to say there's kind of like three ways I find out about things.

17:32The first one is a lot of research myself. So like I spend a lot of time looking up like recurring cultural events in New York City, you know, looking on Eventbrite, Google, like all sources like that. The other is that brands will tell me about things now now that my account's gotten bigger i get a lot of pr inbound whether it's for festivals concerts pop-ups things like that and then lastly is my followers will tell me like they'll be like just saw this on the street and then i'll be like oh i didn't know about that well that's pretty cool yeah i feel like i have a lot of sources everywhere which is kind of nice because i think it's kind of impossible for one person to know everything in a city like this so my goal is just to try to share as much as possible so use all the help i get oh that's really nice.

18:15I like that. I really like that. Rebecca, have you noticed a shift in the types of free events offered in NYC over the years? Yeah, I mean, this kind of parallels what I was saying earlier. I feel like the rise of pop-ups started and maybe really peaked or not peaked. It really started in 2022. After COVID, when things were safe to be in person, I feel like brands were just like, let's have these in-person experiences and get our products in the hands of the masses versus like, you know, just giving it to influencers, just putting it up on a billboard and a subway ad. So I think that has really changed.

18:49And I specifically remember when I started my account, they still had these events, but they were rare and people didn't know about them as much. Right. So I went to this event and they gave me some free, like a free smoothie and a free phone charger. And I was like, wait, this is so cool. Why is no one here? Like, why do people not know about this? So now I think like big companies have shifted their marketing dollars to the awareness and in-person events right has been pretty cool for the public in terms of new york city like there's i mean there's always been so many free events like concert series like think about shakespeare in the park it's been happening for you know 50 plus years yeah so i think new york has been a great city for free events like from a culture perspective for quite a while and that hasn't maybe changed as much but i feel like the brand side has has increased a lot for sure.

19:34I love that. I agree. I do agree. You know, a little bit of a side note real quick, which I think is really important that I love that you have on your page that I noticed is two things that in addition to showing free things in New York City, you also do some things that are really helpful, especially for younger people. I saw two things that I absolutely loved on your page. One was free meals for the summertime for, you know, know, people under 18 and then also, you know, the free mental health help. Can you tell us a little about those? The first is when schools are not in session, the New York City schools still give free meals, breakfast and lunch.

20:13I love it. To anyone under 18. And so they have a few different ways of doing this. They go to a lot of like parks or pools or even schools. They have a couple of food trucks that run on the weekends as well. And so I went by and they just give you, you can like, I think choose your main or something like that. And you don't have to really show ID. You don't have to be a public school versus a private school. It's really just open to anybody, which is nice. The other one is Talkspace has partnered with the New York City Health Systems to offer free therapy to anyone 13 to 17 in New York City. I love that.

20:48Which is really important for high schoolers to just kind of have that support, especially in such a big city like this. right and you're going through those teen years where you're just learning about yourself and everything and it's important i love that when i saw that i was just like this is this is really amazing really i think it's really important you know so good for you yeah i know there's i try to i mean i try to on my account like there's obviously the brand pop-ups but i really try to augment that with you know free resources whether it's like about the lesser known parks or museums premiums to resources like that.

21:26So I try to make it all balanced and not just be one thing or another and try to show the well-rounded of like all the free things that, you know, you can do in New York City. Right. Really smart. Yeah. Really. Love it. Love it. Love it. So Rebecca, which season offers the best free activities in NYC and why, you think? Hmm. I feel like every season has something different to it. I feel like September is really busy in terms of events. There's New New York Fashion Week, the U.S. Open. People are back to school. It's not kind of everyone on vacation in the summer, but there's a ton of events in the summer as well.

22:02Right. And then in December, there's all the holiday stuff. Oh, my gosh, we're bombarded. I can tell you the least. I feel like from January to March, maybe January to April is probably the lowest season of free pop-ups and events in New York City. Completely agree. Yeah, January is the most depressing month of New York City. You know what? It's funny you said that, and that's why I go to Florida now. every month for January. Hi, my grandma lives part-time in Florida now, so we try to go for a week in January every year. What city? She's in Delray. Oh, nice. My parents are on the west side of, where's Delray?

22:35On the east or west? On the east side. Yeah, I'm on the, my parents are like Sarasota, you know, southwest Florida. So, you know, my parents are getting a little bit older, so I make sure every January I go down there and spend time with my parents and my family. And I spent a lot of time in Orlando too growing up. Yeah. See my friends there too. So Rebecca, have you had moments where someone told you a free event you posted made a real difference in their life? Yeah, I get a lot of messages from people, which is really nice. And like some messages I get are, you know, people lost their jobs. People are depressed.

23:12They lost a family member. And going to these events has helped them get out of the house and like enjoy themselves. and I've gotten a few longer messages with like specific stories but those have all been you know obviously I'm really glad that I'm able to help people find ways to like get out and be happy and enjoy New York City. Don't you love that? Yeah. You know I you know just a little you know I mentioned once in a while just the messages I'll get to my social media you know that that people are so you know it's their dream to live here too and they tell us that which helps me not take the city for granted as well and it's i like looking at new york city like a tourist sometimes because you don't realize like i remember i came back from europe and i was thinking like wow the train stations there were so beautiful and then i went to grand central and i'm like wait this is also a really beautiful train station but you never think twice when you go there every day or something like oh yeah that's true that's true rebecca how do you handle the negativity about that we get on our social media.

24:13Sometimes my parents will be like, did you see those comments? And I'm like, no, I don't really try not to read them if they're negative. You just take it with a grain of salt. Right. I feel like people, when they're online, they like to, you know, share. They like to be negative because you're kind of behind a wall. You're not in person. 100 % agree. And I think with having such a large platform, you're bound to get some negative comments. So I just don't really let it bother me. Sometimes it can bother me more than others. like I don't know recently I posted about um a tree house and a garden love and I got it's so nice and I got so many comments that were like stop sharing this to transplants like what are you doing like stop and I'm just like you clearly have very strong opinions but there are things in New York City that are open to everybody so it's a public space and just because someone moved here four years ago or one year ago doesn't mean they have any less right to enjoy a public space than you do can you tell our audience about that tree house that we're talking about yeah so there's a few community gardens in the east village there's actually three on 6th street that are all really nice looking at that your page with these and so there's a tree house in one there's books inside of it uh that's 6bc garden then there's also 6b garden and their space is huge and i this was really cool for me to see they have a theater they have like free like events for kids and families and you if you're live nearby you can get your own garden plot so and then there's a smaller one a few blocks down from there but it's really nice there thoryside right or the east village east village yeah i love that tree house you know what's funny is you know i posted the um green acre park with the waterfall yep you know on the east side everyone's like delete this why are you Yeah.

26:01I mean, people were like, you know, because I put hidden gem on the east side and people were like, this is on Facebook. And they were just like, just hundreds of comments of like, well, now it's not, you know, hidden gem anymore. You know, it's funny. I actually stopped using the phrase hidden gem because like. Yeah, it's smart, actually. Yeah. And I also, like I said, like, I feel like everything on social media nowadays, like has been shared at one point or another, unless it's entirely new. So, yeah. But I found when I said that people would like make comments. Yeah. So moving forward. I like that park though.

26:35Greenacre is very nice. It's beautiful. Jay, have you been to that park? I have actually. And actually I just recommended to someone. I met, I think during Dodgeball, but he was saying that he had friends visiting, like what's somewhere they could take him. And I was thinking through the catalog of stuff that we talked about on the show. And I was like, Greenacre park is really nice. and so I have to follow up with him to see if he ended up going but yeah I've been actually I went I remember distinctly we went on a Spanish trip in high school to see Don Quixote right like a play and it was in that area and we went to Greenacre Park afterwards for lunch I love it and I feel like when people complain like maybe if a post goes super viral it gets pretty crowded for like a couple days after but these community spots like it evens out right i mean like it's one thing i pop up like it's only a weekend you can have like five hour lines but some of these like the tree i was like maybe for a couple days but like it's it's there forever for all right i'm glad you said it's only saturday open saturday and sunday right yeah and i think on wednesdays and fridays at night if a garden member opens it it will be open from like 5 to 8 p.m because i went there to do a live video recently and it was closed like in a weekday and i didn't know and then i you know thanks to you now i know now i've actually been trying to visit it for like two years so yeah that tree house is so cute that park is so cute rebecca what are your top tips for making the most of nyc without spending too much money i think there's so many i mean there's so many things you can do for free in new york city um and i think it's just planning so for example like every museum you want to see there are free days for most of them sometimes i might not be at like the opportune time.