Central Ohio’s restaurant landscape may be in better shape in 2021 than it was in 2020 — but it’s still far from normal.
A volatile industry in the most stable of times, the Covid-19 pandemic, now in its 18th month, has proven to be an added business complication beyond the normal ebb-and-flow of the industry. Though sales have improved over a disastrous 2020 for many as restrictions on business have been lifted or lessened, difficulty hiring continues to hold many back. And though government support helped many survive 2020, that aid appears to be exhausted at the moment.
According to a recent National Restaurant Association survey, the restaurant industry is down 1 million jobs from pre-pandemic levels, about an 8% drop.
The latest Ohio Restaurant Association survey noted that about two-thirds of respondents still expect to at least break even in 2021, a figure that’s held steady for several surveys now.
Still, closings are occurring, with lingering pandemic impacts often cited as a driving factor.
Check out the slideshow with this story for a look at the restaurants that have shuttered so far this year.
Village Taco on Parsons Avenue, for example, has said it will close this fall as its owners are unwilling to take on any more debt to keep the business going.
Momo Ghar opened a full-service Dublin restaurant but doing so led to the permanent closure of its original Northland location. There weren’t enough employees to operate both plus its North Market space.
Though Cleveland-based Platform Beer has said it plans to reopen its Columbus taproom, that space has been closed since March after an employee walkout.
The crown jewel of Cameron Mitchell Restaurants’ dining portfolio, M at Miranova, technically closed in March 2020, though the company did not decide to make that permanent until this year. Considerations of a Covid and post-Covid world were a factor.
Not every decision has been Covid-driven, however.
Main Bar downtown closed to make way for the site's eventual redevelopment.
Real estate deals also were the drivers of decisions to close the Old Bag of Nails in Gahanna and the Tee Jaye’s Country Place in Clintonville earlier this year.
And not every decision is permanent. Tee Jaye’s is coming back with a new restaurant space a few blocks south. Several other closings this year were precursors to new spaces or new ideas.
Rockmill Tavern is closed for the time being, but is being converted into a pizza concept.
Yellow Brick Pizza closed its flagship location in Olde Towne East, but has a new site lined up in a new nearby food hall.
If there’s a positive to be gleaned, it is that closings seem to have slowed from last year's pace, at least through the first two-thirds of the 2021.
Dozens of local restaurants closed last year, ranging from decades old operations like Spagio and the Brazenhead, to younger local-owned places like Ambrose & Eve and Firefly American Bistro to underperforming units for national and regional chains like Bob Evans, Burger King, Pizza Hut and White Castle.