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Brian Treitman, owner of B.T.'s Smokehouse in Sturbridge
3 hours ago
B.T.’s Fried Chicken and BBQ to close Sunday
Photo/Grant welker
B.T.'s Fried Chicken & BBQ opened its Worcester location near the start of the pandemic.
Citing ongoing industry hardships, Worcester restaurant B.T.’s Fried Chicken and BBQ will close up shop permanently on Sunday.
Price increases for food and goods were the main catalysts for the restaurant’s closure, B.T.’s co-owner Brian Treitman said.
“It's really difficult to be able to raise my prices and pass it on to the customer and make a profit,” Treitman said.
Since opening in October 2020 at 318 Park Ave. in Worcester as an offshoot of Sturbridge-based barbecue restaurant B.T.’s Smokehouse, Treitman said his cost of labor has increased 17%, food costs have risen by nearly 20%, and paper goods have almost doubled in price. When he opened, the cost of brisket was $2.29 per pound, a price that has since more than doubled to $4.69. With prices like those, he said B.T.'s would have to charge nearly $20 a sandwich to make ends meet, a price tag he says too many in Worcester aren’t willing to pay.
“Reading through the comments that I've seen on the Worcester Eats and some of the other pages, we're just too expensive for Worcester when you can go down the street to one of the chains,” he said.
Treitman has read commenters compare his shop’s prices to the sandwich shop Arby’s, a chain he said is incomparable to his in terms of buying power. In fact, he said when Arby’s began offering brisket on its menu, his price of brisket rose 23 cents and another 20 cents when Chipotle Mexican Grill began selling brisket in 2021.
Treitman’s flagship B.T.’s Smokehouse in Sturbridge will continue operations with no risk of closure, he said.
The difference between B.T.’s Worcester and Sturbridge locations is that its Worcester shop relies heavily on third-party delivery apps, with more than 50% of its business coming through the likes of DoorDash and Grubhub. On the other hand, the Sturbridge restaurant is treated as more of a destination, said Treitman.
“It’s a different mentality,” he said.
The Sturbridge location sees 75% of its business come through dine-in eating with only 25% generated through takeout or delivery.
Last year, 10% of the sales of B.T.’s in Worcester ended up going to paying third-party delivery fees.
“We just lost all of our profit,” said Treitman.
While the shop tried to get customers to order delivery through its website in an effort to eliminate fees, the restaurant wasn’t able to compete with the ease of pressing “Order” on an app.
Treitman said he unfortunately saw the closing coming for some time before the restaurant’s Sunday announcement.
“I put it off probably longer than I should have waited longer than I should have hoping that things would turn around a little bit,” he said.
He raised B.T.’s prices in January and was hoping to see positive effects, but in the end the business was simply not viable.
“It's really hard,” he said. “It's not just us … From talking to other restaurants around the city is the same.”
With B.T.’s closure, 11 of the shops 12 staff will be laid off while Treitman will attempt to keep on the location’s manager, who has been with the B.T.’s enterprise since before the Worcester site’s opening. Most of the shop’s staff have other jobs, but for those who don’t, Treitman will be working to secure them new positions through industry connections. The location’s co-owner, William Nemeroff, will not continue with the restaurant, focusing on his career with a Boston food service company.
Knowing the strain his fellow small business owners are under, going forward, Treitman hopes his peers don’t face the same outcome as him.
“I would really love to see Worcester succeed and be able to support all the small businesses,” he said.
Mica Kanner-Mascolo is a staff writer at Worcester Business Journal, who primarily covers the healthcare and diversity, equity, and inclusion industries.
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