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Best Counterculture Enterprise

Sound Splash

Matt Reynolds's all-ages, punk-rock, green-anarchist exchange of all things musical is going on its tenth year, having migrated slowly south from its original North Palm Beach location to Okeechobee Boulevard, and thence to its present locale in the industrial neighborhood along Georgia Avenue. A bare-bones operation of roughly cut shelves and record bins, Sound Splash is home to the area's largest collection of alternative-music rarities, as well as radical and oddball literature. Fliers on the walls tell you how to hook up with a ride to the next antiglobalization showdown or militant feminist poetry workshop. Evenings feature the occasional thrash-ska hoedown. The new space (store implies too much organization) includes an interlinking set of courtyards out back, where you can feed the cockatoo.

Best Flea Market

Fort Lauderdale Swap Shop

Sure, we've named this place Best Tourist Trap and Best Cheap Thrill in past years but, hey, it's a phenomenon. In this age of Disneyfied, mega-indoor shopping outlets à la Sawgrass Mills, it's good to know there's still a freak in the family. The Swap has been attracting tourists and an ever-diversifying mix of locals since 1966. Just driving through the eastern parking lots, which circle large drive-in movie screens (new releases screen every night for $3.50 per person), is enough fun to make the trip worthwhile, with vendors hawking everything from wooden back scratchers to fishing rods. Canvas tents cover a good deal of the outdoor shopping, where myriad pairs of granny underwear in varying tones of fuchsia and teal await. The notoriously labyrinthine, two-story indoor hall houses more stairs than an M.C. Escher drawing. A free circus performs daily -- three times a day on weekends. Upstairs, Elvis slot machines, two-inch gold crucifix pendants, and Oriental swords greet you from booths and kiosks. The Swap Shop is open Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturdays and Sundays 5 a.m. to 6 p.m., and parking is free.

Best Florist

Field of Flowers

You'll have no excuse to live without fragrance and beauty once you've discovered Field of Flowers, the floral supermarket with locations in Davie and Coral Springs. Owner Donn F. Flipse is a third-generation florist: Granddad Jimmy migrated to Miami from Scotland at the outset of the last century and opened a landscaping and flower business, dad Fred joined after World War II, and Donn took up the trowel in 1971, opening Field of Flowers in 1990. The two locations offer 150 varieties of fresh-cut flowers by the stem, bunch, or arrangement. And they're cheap! Of the five-dozen available arrangements, half cost less than $50; they start at $17.50 for a little charmer called "Minuet" and average about $35. All are on display in the store's glass refrigerators, but if you can't make it to one of the sites, you can order over the Internet. Prefer to do it yourself but don't know how? Attend floral design school, in which you'll create arrangements using fresh-cut flowers, live plants, and accessories. And should you find yourself at the Davie store on a Saturday afternoon, take advantage of the free cake-tasting, compliments of Susie's Scrumptious Sweets. Susie started this custom some years ago to develop a cake-baking business, which is now booming. Hey, why quit while you're ahead?

Best Garage

Davie Garage

Is there such a thing as an honest mechanic? Yes, yes, yes! For the last 35 years, Davie Garage has been driving home the point that honesty is the best way to keep customers. If you go more than twice the employees will likely remember your name when you walk in the door. Stop in for an oil change and pay a mere $30.74, cash on the barrel, tax included. That's right. Credit cards and checks are not accepted, thank you very much. Bob, Mark, Steve, or Vinnie will take your car for a test run afterward, just to make sure everything's all right. If it ain't broke, they won't fix it. The employees also make a point of being accessible; they are the "service specialists" and the mechanics on your car, unlike so many dealerships where no one knows your name or cares about you. If you wait while your car is serviced, you'll wait in the office, where the business dealings are transparent. Davie Garage doesn't need gimmicks like a chair massage, cappuccino machine, or complimentary car wash. They simply do an honest day's work for an honest day's pay. In the world of automobile service, that's rare indeed.

Best Head Shop

Grateful J's Dead Head Shop

There was a time when head shops were pretty much about one thing: drug paraphernalia. Then came the war on drugs. Some head shops folded; others diversified. When Jay Work, owner of Grateful J's Dead Head Shop, opened his store, he took the latter approach. His five-year-old business offers body piercing at its Margate location and glass-blowing lessons at the Boca Raton branch. A selection of colorful glass pipes is available at both joints -- "sold as art and not intended for smoking," of course -- along with other accessories meant for use "with tobacco only." J's also offers the requisite incense and T-shirts, as well as a smattering of "adult toys" and a full line of licensed Grateful Dead products. But what really sets his operation apart from others of its ilk in SoFla, says Work, is the tape exchange. "We're the only store that gives away music," he explains. Take in a blank tape, choose from the huge inventory of live Dead shows (dating back to 1965, and all authorized for reproduction by Grateful Dead Productions), and J's will copy it for you.

Best Health Food Store

Whole Foods Market

Yeah, it's a chain. But at least it's a chain of health food stores, as oxymoronic as that notion might seem. Indeed the quirky nature of South Florida capitalism has dictated that the store with the best selection of health food, prepared meals, and offbeat products (soy Bisquick, for example) is a virtual monopoly. Whole Foods stores -- despite their membership in a 75-store national corporation -- do a wonderful job offering an array of designer protein powders, organic produce, premade tofu sandwiches, frozen fake meat, and other vegetarian staples. Some of Whole Foods' bigger locations even boast smoothie bars, eateries, and aisle upon aisle of soy creations. Leftist principles aside Whole Foods will expertly satisfy even the most granola-loving South Floridians.

Best Kids' Clothing

Think Thrift

You could take your hard-earned cash to Sawgrass Mills or any other mall for that matter and spend it outfitting the tykes. You could also wad it up and throw it in the crapper. As far as we're concerned, it's about the same thing. The fact is that kids outgrow clothes so fast that buying brand-new, name-brand stuff for them is a sure way to spend yourself into the poor house. And the clothes they don't outgrow, they'll refuse to wear because the styles have changed. We recommend you bypass the whole retail mess and shop Think Thrift, Broward County's premier secondhand store. It has racks of kids' clothes organized by article and sex, and most of it looks barely used. You'll find shorts, shirts, pants, and even shoes for less than five bucks. You can pick up a good winter jacket for $10 or so, about right given the few times you'll need it around here; and you can buy baby sleeping gear for less than a buck.

Best Liquor Store

67 Wine & Spirits

Let's say you need an impertinent little Cretan wine to entertain some visiting Greeks -- say, a 1998 bottle of Kretikos white. You can find it for just $10.99 at 67 Wine & Spirits, along with vino from such places as Israel, Hungary, Transylvania, and Georgia (the former Soviet republic, not the state). Did we mention that 67 also carries an enormous selection of wines from France, Italy, Australia, and the United States, as well as a full six shelves of sherries and ports? From high-end offerings (a 1994 Chateau Mouton Rothschild Pauillac for $219.99) to run-of-the-vineyard fare (the ones with twist-off tops), you'll find them at this jam-packed little store. The store also has an equally diverse selection of liquors, along with gourmet items, prepared foods, and even a tiny cigar room. Three other 67 locations in Broward and Palm Beach counties offer comparable goods, but we prefer the one on Federal for the perverse thrill that comes from buying forbidden fruit just a few feet from the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, headquarters of the ultraconservative Rev. James D. Kennedy.

Best Men's Clothing

R.S. Lords

You have to admire the salesmen at R.S. Lords. Surrounded by thousands of suits and sport jackets, they gracefully put up with a sweltering climate that makes wearing a suit and tie tantamount to death by smothering. That's not to mention casual Fridays and beachfolks' aversion to anything that ain't shorts cum flip-flops. But persevere they do, with all the dignity of a double-breasted jacket. Weather and fashion fads notwithstanding, all men sooner or later must don a suit for a wedding, funeral, bar mitzvah, job interview, or a mother's satisfaction. When your day comes, you can't go wrong with this one-of-a-kind store that imports a large selection of Italian suits and offers on-site tailoring and alterations. Whether nature made you tall, short, or portly, Lords carries your size at a reasonable price -- how about an Italian suit at $199? If that's not enough, salesmen Art, Artie, and Kenny take great pride in guessing a customer's size before whipping out a tape measure.

Best Pawn Shop

National Pawn & Jewelry

Other people's misfortune is your felicity at National Pawn & Jewelry. And judging by the inventory at this vast warehouse of all things pawned, a lot of people are in need of quick cash around here. On a recent visit, this shop had everything from chop saws to scuba tanks, bicycles to go-karts, vacuum cleaners to fax machines. It had dozens of guitars, hundreds of cameras, scores of stereos, and a jewelry section bigger than most gem stores. We even found a couple thousand CDs from which to choose, priced at $5.95 each or $4.95 if you buy ten or more. (We can't imagine who was desperate enough to pawn his Kiss collection.) Last time we stopped in, we were impressed to see a vintage Harley-Davidson for sale. Perhaps the previous owner needed bail money. Who knows? Who cares? It's all here, the store guarantees what it sells, and the prices are pretty good.

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