Mountain Sun owner: Boulder restaurant biz increasingly challenging

BOULDER — Faced with inflated costs, reduced traffic and hiring difficulties, the restaurant business in Boulder and beyond is increasingly challenging, according to the owner of local restaurant group Mountain Sun Pubs. 

As a result of these headwinds, Mountain Sun’s Under the Sun Pub & Pizza on Broadway in Boulder will serve its last pie and pint on Saturday — at least for now. 

“This is the challenge of doing business in the restaurant business in the post-pandemic world,”  Mountain Sun proprietor Kevin Daly told BizWest this week. “It’s a combination of labor costs, staffing shortages and slow business sales.”

While it’s always disappointing to have to close the doors on a business venture, “we’re really happy that we made it 11 years,” he said.

Under the Sun, tucked away beneath sister restaurant Southern Sun Pub & Brewery at 627 S. Broadway, has been open since 2013. 

“Boulder has such a housing shortage that we now have a worker shortage,” Daly said. “It’s really, really hard” to find staff. 

In addition to Under the Sun and Southern Sun, Mountain Sun operates the Mountain Sun Pub & Brewery on Pearl Street in Boulder, Longs Peak Pub & Taphouse in Longmont and Vine Street Pub in Denver. The latter just reopened last month after a four-year closure following the COVID-19 outbreak. 

“We opened up Vine Street (in Denver) and it was just so easy (to staff) and there were more customers. The demographics of Boulder have changed; it’s become a rich, old, white city. And there’s just not enough people eating out … and nobody wants to commute to Boulder to work,” Daly said. “It’s an extremely difficult town (in which to run a restaurant). High rents, older population. …Our Pearl Street location is down too, but it’s easier to run because it’s small.”

In Longmont, “Longs Peak has been busy,” he said. “Because the rents are lower, there are a lot more young people moving to Longmont and outside of Boulder. Boulder is going to become a very challenging place to do business in.”

Under the Sun’s management team said that they have found positions for Under the Sun workers at the company’s other restaurants, and that the South Broadway space will remain available for private parties. 

“We have a lease for two more years, so we’ll probably do private events,” Daly said. “And if we can bring back staffing,” the owners could take a shot at reopening Under the Sun. “The concept was kind of successful. It’s just been a super slow summer” both in terms of customer visits and hiring. 

Daly quantified the chance of reopening as “a slim one.” But there’s a possibility that Mountain Sun could “consolidate that business (with Southern Sun) into one location that’s easier to run.”

Boulder business leaders acknowledge the challenges facing the city’s restaurateurs. 

Restaurants, Boulder Chamber CEO John Tayer said, “are key elements of the character of (the city) and are something that makes Boulder special.”

However, he said, “there are significant additional new costs that our restaurants and small businesses are absorbing, be it high property tax rates, additional inflation in costs of goods and workforce expenses. That is (compounded) by the loss of foot traffic and business associated with office vacancy and reduced employee traffic downtown during the days.”

Boulder officials are expected to soon begin discussing the possibility of increasing the minimum wage, a prospect that some in the business community claim could further exacerbate profitability struggles for local restaurants. 

“Our first call would be to do no additional harm,” Tayer said. “While the city now is considering the potential minimum wage increase, we’d certainly ask them to reflect on the impact that would potentially have on our restaurants and small businesses.”