Goodbye, Houlihan's: Cherry Hill restaurant location abruptly closes
CHERRY HILL – The party is over at Houlihan’s here.
The restaurant chain’s only South Jersey location closed abruptly Saturday at The Market Place at Garden State Park
It was the latest shutdown for a chain that’s shed more than a dozen locations in recent years, including eight in New Jersey.
The restaurant operated at its Route 70 location since 2008, when it moved from smaller quarters at the nearby Cherry Hill Mall.
Signs on the front door of the Cherry Hill restaurant expressed regret, but gave no reason for the closing. They said Houlihan’s was working to relocate employees "immediately to one of our nearby locations."
The Houlihan's name was removed from the building after the closing. A trash bin outside the eatery was filled with cast-off poinsettias, holiday wreaths and other decorations, as well as a worker's tie, plastic tubs and other debris.
Where is the nearest Houlihan’s now?
The doorway signs direct customers to a Houlihan’s in Brick, Ocean County. That’s about 50 miles from Cherry Hill, as is a Houlihan’s in New Brunswick, Middlesex County.
If you’d like to travel farther, Houlihan’s website improbably lists a location on Mars – in the Gale Crater, to be exact.
A representative of Houlihan's owner, Landry's Inc. of Houston, could not be reached for immediate comment.
The chain now has 33 locations in 14 states, down from 47 when a former operator sought bankruptcy protection in 2018.
Houlihan's, which describe its niche as “polished fast casual,” has seven locations in Central and North Jersey.
Costly wage dispute
A franchisor in 2018 agreed to pay $5 million to settle allegations by the U.S. Department of Labor that it had violated wage-and-hour laws at the New Jersey restaurants, including the Cherry Hill location, and at two sites in New York state. The money went to more than 1,400 current and former employees.
A.C.E. Restaurant Group of Saddle Brook, Bergen County, neither admitted nor denied the agency’s claims in resolving the dispute, a consent order noted.
Jim Walsh is a senior reporter for the Courier-Post, Burlington County Times and The Daily Journal.
This article originally appeared on Cherry Hill Courier-Post: Houlihan's in Cherry Hill shopping center closes
