Restaurant Impossible - Mystic Treats Update - Closed

Photo - Twitter

Tonight on Restaurant: Impossible, Robert Irvine and his crew are in Ashland, Oregon to makeover Mystic Treats.  The owners Mike and Erika opened the restaurant three years ago and hoped to attract customers with their vegetarian and offbeat pizzas.  That concept has failed them and Robert needs to educate the owners, get them to choose an identity for the restaurant and redesign the menu.  As I normally do with Restaurant: Impossible episodes, I searched around the Internet to read stories, comments and reviews about Mystic Treats to get an idea of how the restaurant is doing since Robert Irvine visited, and here is what I found (note - all reviews are post Restaurant: Impossible):



This will not be a normal update as the restaurant is already closed.  The Restaurant Impossible makeover was in early November and the restaurant closed just a month after that in early December.

On December 8th, 2014, they posted on their Facebook page (which is no longer active):

"We have decided to close.  Over the next week, we will be selling several small items. come in and say goodbye."

Other News and Links:

• The restaurant was in Talent, Oregon for 2 years, then moved to Ashland, Oregon.  The move cost the restaurant about $40,000 and their rent increased from $1,750 a month to $3,200 a month and eventually increased to $4,200 a month due to terms that increased rent $500 every 6 months. The building the restaurant is in has hosted many restaurants over the past 16 years. (Link)
• In a September 2014 article, the restaurant said they were a week away from closing, and borrowed $5,000 from a loyal customer to stay open.  They said the rent was steep and they were behind on rent.  They also said the landlord was "tenacious."
• When the restaurant closed, they posted some drama with their landlord on their Twitter page,, which is linked to their Instagram.  They said they were locked out by the landlord and offered no flexibility.  They also captioned a picture with, "$10,000 MAKEOVER - Now that we had the space renovated Becker Property can't wait to force Mystic Treats out so they can make even more money off our failure."  The restaurant also posted an email from the property management company that said they could remove their personal items, but if TV cameras were present, the doors would stay locked.
• The retail space is listed for lease at $1.75 per square foot per month.  With there being 3,868 square feet, that puts monthly rent at $6,769, which is a large increase from what Mystic Treats was paying.
• If you are interested in reviews of the restaurant, here are some from Yelp and Tripadvisor.

Conclusion:

It sounds like this one didn't have much of a chance as they were too far behind on rent and they had a landlord that wanted the money they were owed.  Moving their restaurant to the new location seems to be what doomed them.

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