As many know, my restaurant Edzo's Burger Shop closed after 15 years of burger-fries-and-shake excellence in downtown Evanston. We had a good run, but our crucial weekday business just never picked up since Covid.

When we announced were closing, the outpouring of support from the local community during the final week really made me realize how much restaurants can mean to people and how much being a part of a community of supportive, like-minded folks means to me.

I created Edzo's as an expression of myself and the things I love; Chicago-style hot-dog-stand food, classic rock, a 70's retro vibe, and a hands-on approach in which I treat each customer as if they were a guest in my home. That includes good hospitality, but it has also meant saying no sometimes, plenty of good-natured banter, and even taking a customer to task once in a while for being rude or inconsiderate.

Plenty of people didn't care for my 'no-frills' "customer isn't always right" approach to hospitality, but those that got it became regulars and we've had many wonderful relationships with our longtime repeat customers over the years.

So when we announced we were closing, hundreds and hundreds of regulars came to have their last garlic fries or char burger, and one thing that really struck me is that I put an authentic version of myself, my principles, and my values, out there, unfiltered, and ALL these people really responded to it.

What an honor. Customer after customer pulled out their phones and showed me photos of all the times they came for hot dogs and fries after their kid's soccer, their birthday patty melt, or the time they brought a Nutella shake for their wife in the hospital after she'd just given birth. We had fed people, sure, and we'd all had some good times, but we also had become a part of this community's MEMORIES. A lot of folks so appreciated the vibe, the food and the culture that I had created, that sincere expression of myself, that they chose to do us the amazing honor of including us in their lives' narratives.

I don't want that to end. So I have been searching for new locations around the North Shore where we might be able to replicate the same success we had with Edzo's for the first 15 years.

But finding the right spot is never easy. We need a black-iron exhaust run because we're working with burger grease and fryers. Landlords want tenants to pay full rent, plus the entire share of property taxes on the prorated space, plus they expect tenants to foot the bill for the build out despite the fact that they'll be keeping all the fixtures and improvements if/when the tenancy ends.

Don't get me started.

And since Edzo's is closed, I do not have an income myself. I'm scared. I don't know how I'm going to pay my mortgage and bills. I've been driving Instacart the last few weeks as I finish at the Sherman Ave. location, selling off as much of the stuff as I can, looking at potential new spaces, meeting with people from economic development departments of various suburbs... It's a lot.

If I end up having to get a job in order to not lose my house, I know it's going to quickly take over nearly all of my time/headspace and I think it will be very difficult to give the time/attention needed to finding a new space to relocate Edzo's and further develop it.

So...that would, I guess, be the justification I would be making in order to be asking people for a charitable donation to help me pay my bills so I can work toward re-opening.  Seems a little presumptuous, honestly.  For now, I think I'm not gonna do it.  With everything I see going on in the world right now, I don't feel right about asking for charitable donations for this.  

I truly believe in my heart that restaurants are a crucial element of community and serve a valuable societal value that's worth many times what folks spend there in dollars.  And that eventually we will come to realize that if we want good restaurants in our communities, we will need to support them in ways beyond just going and spending money on food.  I'm not sure what format that will be in, everything seems to be evolving right now.  I've toyed with setting up some sort of "subscriber" model in which folks pay a monthly fee in order to show their support and in exchange, they get some extra "insider" benefits and perks and there are a few examples of restaurants doing something similar.

So something will evolve, I think to serve the goal of keeping good restaurants serving communities that value them even during times of financial hardship or societal disruption.