Quote:
Originally Posted by Franco401
Construction keeps coming up, has anybody heard anyone say at any point all year that they didn't go downtown, especially to a particular restaurant, because of construction? Gimme a break. The two-block detour caused by the Officer's Square work shouldn't have motivated anyone to take their business elsewhere, nor the Carleton Street closure.
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Yes. Absolutely. When we plan office lunches out, the main restriction is "not downtown." Nobody wants to deal with that when the Uptown/Northside places are so much easier to get to.
Anytime you put traffic obstacles near a business, that business takes a hit. That's not abnormal, it happens everywhere, and it's not hard to verify. So the idea that construction has nothing to do with it is simply false.
That said, it's also true that the more attractive and stronger businesses will still draw despite it. Cannons Cross had absolutely brutal construction around it three summers in a row and still drew people in, although I'm sure they'll be pretty happy to not have to deal with that this year (hopefully!).
If you look at the places that closed, King Street Ale House also mentioned that their space is simply too big for the current craft beer market. When the Garrison first opened there simply wasn't a lot like that, and when it was kicked out and became KSAH, there wasn't nearly as many options. Now the breweries themselves have places to get a drink and a bite to eat, craft beer is all over the place, and the market is far more saturated. In a smaller building they likely would have been alright, but the overhead on a space that large is pretty tough with so much competition.
Things mentioned in the Huddle article their real problem: they used to be the only place selling a lot of those items, and then legalization happened. Now you can buy some of that stuff at Circle K, and business tanked as a result. The market simply shifted under them. That happens all the time and is just an unfortunate reality of business.
Franks and McGinness Landing are two places I found so poor and uninteresting that I honestly don't know how they stayed open as long as they did. Franks was not helped at all by moving, that much is for sure. With the roundabout open, the new place should do better if they can get the food quality up.
I wouldn't be surprised to see Rustico have problems too, that space is huge and the word of mouth I keep hearing is pretty medicore.