Guide · Updated August 2026

Bodega Cats: Why Every Corner Store Cat Deserves a Trading Card

There is a specific New York feeling that happens when you walk into a deli for a coffee and a cat is asleep on the stack of newspapers like it owns the building. It does, in a way. That cat has a name half the block knows, a preferred spot on the counter, and more regulars than most of the human staff. It is a bodega cat, and it is one of the last truly local celebrities left in a city that mostly runs on strangers.

This guide is about why those cats matter, where the culture came from, and why a corner-store cat is the perfect thing to keep as a trading card instead of losing it in your camera roll.

What a bodega cat actually is

A bodega cat is a working cat. In New York, "bodega" means the corner convenience store or deli, and the cat is there for a job: keeping mice and rats out of the chips and the bread. According to the Wikipedia entry on bodega cats, most are ordinary domestic shorthairs rather than any fancy breed, which is part of the charm. This is a regular cat that clocked in.

Shop cats are not new. Store cats were standard in New York by 1900. The Brooklyn Navy Yard kept them for pest control in the 1890s, and the Post Office once employed close to a hundred of them to guard the mail from rats drawn to the glue on envelopes. When Puerto Rican and Dominican families opened corner stores through the mid-1900s, many came from places where a shop cat was simply how you ran a store, and the practice stuck.

Today it is everywhere and nowhere at once. Estimates from 2025 put the share of NYC bodegas with a cat at somewhere between 30 and 40 percent, so on any given block the odds are good, but no two are alike.

Why they became local legends

A bodega cat is a fixed point. People move, rents rise, storefronts turn over, but the cat on the counter is a small constant, and New Yorkers get attached to constants. Whether it is a Puerto Rican bodega in the Bronx, a Dominican shop in Washington Heights, or a Yemeni-owned deli in Brooklyn, the cat is a shared thing that everyone who walks in recognizes.

The internet noticed. Accounts like Bodega Cats of New York have spent years chronicling these cats one photo at a time, and outlets like Untapped Cities have written up their history. There is even a community map at catmaps.nyc where people mark the shop cats near them so others can go say hello. It is famous the way a good diner is famous: not nationally, but completely, within about four blocks.

The legal twist that made everyone care more

Bodega cats have never really been legal. Live animals in a food store violate NYC Health Code section 81.25, and inspectors can fine a store anywhere from 200 to 2,000 dollars for having one. For decades owners just quietly kept their cat and hoped for the best.

That tension boiled over recently. A Change.org petition to legalize and protect working shop cats gathered more than 13,500 signatures, and it turned into real legislation. As amNewYork reported, Councilmember Keith Powers introduced Int. 1471 in late 2025, the first bill in city history meant to protect shop cats, with a line that summed up the whole mood: bodega cats are "friendly, welcoming, and anti-rat." The effort has carried into 2026 as other council members picked it up. When a city starts writing laws to protect a cat that sleeps on the lottery tickets, you know it is more than a cat.

Why a corner-store cat belongs on a card

Most people meet a great bodega cat, take one photo, and never see that photo again. It sinks into a library of four thousand other pictures and the memory goes with it.

A trading card fixes that. Instead of a lost photo, you get an object with a name, a place, and a story attached. Cat Collector does exactly that. You photograph a real cat you meet, and it becomes a hand-drawn die-cut sticker card with your picture on it, the neighborhood where you found it, and you listed as the finder. The bodega cat on 8th Avenue is no longer a blurry photo. It is a card in your collection, dated and placed, the way a good memory should be.

The collecting part is where it gets social in the right way. Share the deli cat's card link with a friend or drop it on your story, and anyone who taps it adds that same cat to their own collection. The cat everyone in the neighborhood already knows becomes a cat everyone can literally hold a copy of. There is even a weekly neighborhood Top Cat board for the most-collected local cats, which is about the most fitting honor a bodega cat could ask for. The cats are checked to be real, not AI, which matters for a culture built entirely on actual animals in actual stores. The app is free and asks for no email.

How to catch a bodega cat the right way

A shop cat is somebody's cat and somebody's coworker, so a little courtesy goes a long way.

Buy something and ask. You are a customer first. Most owners are proud of their cat and happy to say yes.
No flash, no grabbing. Let the cat come to you. Do not corner it or lift it off its perch.
Respect the working cat. If it is stalking something or clearly not in the mood, admire from a distance and move on.
Do not post exact home stores as a stunt. Sharing that a beloved cat exists is lovely. Turning a small shop into a tourist stampede is not. Cat Collector shows a neighborhood rather than a pin on one doorway for this reason.

The point of keeping them

Bodega cats are proof that a city of eight million strangers still builds small, warm, shared things without meaning to. The cat on the counter belongs to everyone who walks in, and it costs nothing to notice.

Keeping that cat as a card is a way of saying the encounter counted. If you want to start, the next time a deli cat blinks at you from the newspapers, catch it. Travelers and wanderers can pick up where this one leaves off with our guide on starting a street-cat Instagram and the one on turning your daily walk into a cat hunt.

Sources and further reading

Frequently asked questions

What is a bodega cat?

A bodega cat is a working cat that lives in a New York City corner store or deli, usually a plain domestic shorthair kept to control mice and rats. Over time many of them become the unofficial mascot of the shop and a familiar face to everyone in the neighborhood.

How many bodegas in NYC have cats?

Estimates from 2025 suggest that somewhere between 30 and 40 percent of the city's bodegas keep a cat. Nobody has an exact count, partly because the cats have never been fully legal, so many owners keep a low profile about them.

Are bodega cats legal in New York?

Technically no. Live animals in food stores break NYC Health Code section 81.25, and fines can run from 200 to 2,000 dollars. A 2025 petition and a City Council bill, Int. 1471, aimed to change that by giving shop cats legal protection, and the effort has carried into 2026.

Where can I find bodega cats near me?

Community projects like Bodega Cats of New York and the map at catmaps.nyc collect photos and locations of shop cats around the city. The easiest way is still to notice the one in your own neighborhood store, since roughly a third of bodegas have one.

Can I turn a bodega cat photo into a trading card?

Yes. Cat Collector is a free iPhone app that turns a photo of a real cat you meet, bodega cats very much included, into a hand-drawn sticker trading card tagged with the place and your name as the finder. Friends can then collect that same cat by tapping a link.

Is it rude to photograph a bodega cat?

It is polite to ask the owner first, buy something, and never use flash or corner the cat. Most bodega owners are proud of their cat. Photograph from a respectful distance, let the cat come to you, and do not pick up a cat you do not know.

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Turn a Cat Photo Into a Trading Card in 10 Seconds

Want a cute cat card, not a design project? Here is the fastest way to turn a cat photo into a collectible trading card on iPhone, free.

Free on the App Store. The bodega cat is waiting.