Along with swelling case counts and death tolls from COVID-19, the tally of restaurant closures continues to rise as the food industry grapples with financial woes and employee safety.
One by one Dallas’ restaurants are shuttering, each closure drastically altering the landscape of a city that recently established itself as one of the nation’s great restaurant collectives.
Some restaurants, like Lucia and Macellaio in Bishop Arts, closed up shop temporarily as management teams sort out safe ways to prepare and serve food while maintaining social distancing. Others shuttered indefinitely with hopes of opening their doors when it’s safe to do so.
Dino Santonicola, the former master pizzaiolo at Cane Rosso who now runs Partenope Ristorante in downtown Dallas with wife Megan Santonicola, was one of the first in the city to close his restaurant in response to COVID-19.
Santonicola anxiously watched from afar as the virus ravaged his native Italy, but when the deadly illness found its way into Dallas, he made the decision to temporarily shut down his new restaurant on March 17, the day the city mandated the closure of restaurant dining rooms.
“It was very difficult for us to stay open and try to limit contact with people because the whole business was about welcoming people, shaking people’s hands, making people feel comfortable. So basically our whole concept collapsed. There was this big fear to even touch each other,” Santonicola says. “Sometimes I see a restaurant trying to do to-go, but in a small kitchen, how are you going to do it? You have to have contact and sometimes you can’t stand 6 feet away from each other.”
He says he’s terrified of the virus and what it’s doing to his business and those like his, but he sleeps at night knowing he made the right call for his family and his staff.
“I do not regret closing the restaurant,” Santonicola says. “All of the staff healthwise is safe. It was best for everyone. But at least we know no one got sick because of us. I could never forgive myself if someone who worked with me got sick.”
He’s not sure when he might be able to fire up the pizza oven and reopen Partenope, but he says he knows it won’t be anytime soon.
“Every day it changes. When we shut down, we thought maybe toward the end of May we would reopen, but now it doesn’t look like it will be May. Maybe June,” he adds. “We will try to reopen as soon as it’s safe. But I just don’t know.”
While most restaurants have closed with intentions to reopen, some closed for good.
John McBride, the restaurateur behind several North Texas eateries, was quick to shut down his East Dallas beer garden, The LOT, permanently.
The indoor/outdoor restaurant relied heavily on the spring and fall seasons for most of its business, and as soon as it became clear that spring business would be no more, McBride made the call to close it.
“We were going along hoping spring would be a great season for us this year," he says. “When you take days or weeks out of that season, it becomes virtually impossible. When you close down for any period of time, it’s not like the clock starts at zero then. It started at zero 30 days ago. You have past vendor bills, you have sales tax, you have payroll, you have rent. All these things add up on top of you very quickly, and very few people have the resources or the stash of income to make good.”
The finances can pencil out for some concepts, though.
McBride also owns El Vecino, an East Dallas Tex Mex restaurant that is managing to stay afloat with takeout and delivery only.
“It’s in a neighborhood, which I think makes a big difference right now,” he says. “And it was a big takeout business before, and that’s just pure luck.”
While his restaurant is able to stay open for now, McBride says its viability requires daily evaluation. If takeout orders dry up and fail to cover labor costs, that’s when it’s time to shut down, he says.
And he expects to see more and more restaurants face that brutal reality.
“I think what’s happening now is that when the city said you could do takeout, everyone saw a glimmer of hope," he says. "Everybody is trying to hang on to some kind of hope, but as each day and week goes by, it’s just getting more and more difficult because you’re just so far behind. Unless you have cash to grab hold of somewhere, you just flat out run out of money.”
Braindead Brewing in Deep Ellum is holding on by a thread by offering takeout only on Wednesdays and Saturdays, but the future of business hangs delicately in the balance as sales slow to a trickle, says owner Sam Wynne.
“It depends on the whims of about 15 different things like the landlord and whether or not the government fulfills their promises,” he says. “We’re in the patio business more than anything else, so we limp through ... looking forward to patio season and got this instead.”
Here are Dallas-area restaurants that have either temporarily or permanently closed:
Alamo Club: 1919 Greenville Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
AllGood Cafe: 2934 Main St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
CBD Provisions: 1530 Main St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Cool River: 1045 Hidden Ridge, Irving. Status: Temporarily closed
Corn Dog With No Name: 10220 Technology Blvd., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
El Come Taco: 2513 N. Fitzhugh Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Garden Cafe: 5310 Junius St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Gemma: 2323 N Henderson Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Harlowe MXM: 2823 Main St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed.
Haute Sweets: 10230 E. Northwest Highway, Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Haystack Burgers: 3838 Oak Lawn Ave., Dallas; 6705 Main St., Frisco; 100 S. Central Expressway, Richardson. Status: Temporarily closed
Lucia: 408 W. Eighth St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Paradiso: 308 N. Bishop Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Partenope Ristorante: 1903 Main St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Macellaio: 287 N. Bishop Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Pink Magnolia: 642 W. Davis St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Pho Is for Lovers: 5521 Greenville Ave., Dallas; 1551 E. Renner Road, Richardson. Status: Temporarily closed
Rapscallion: 2023 Greenville Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Sachet: 4270 Oak Lawn Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Shoals Sound & Service: 2614 Elm St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Society Bakery: 3610 Greenville Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
STIRR: 2803 Main St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Serious Pizza: 2807 Elm St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
The LOT: 7530 E. Grand Ave., Dallas. Status: Permanently closed
Tulum: 4216 Oak Lawn Ave., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
Vidorra Dallas: 2642 Main St., Dallas. Status: Temporarily closed
