SteamRoller Bagel Sandwiches closing after five years in Granville
After nearly five years in downtown Granville, SteamRoller Bagel Sandwiches is closing.
Owner Jay Snyder shared the news on the restaurant's Facebook page Thursday, Nov. 18. The main reason for the closure, Snyder said in the post, is because all the full-time staff members have moved on to other jobs that offer additional benefits including health and dental insurance, a 401(k), and weekends off.
As of Nov. 23, Snyder plans for the final day to be Dec. 19, but it will likely be sooner as the supplies dwindle.
In a phone interview, Snyder said said closing the business, which started as a food truck in 2014 and has called Granville home since January 2017, isn't an easy decision.
"I started with a crew that was super enthusiastic, amazing people and we treated them well and, you know, the idea was not really to build a restaurant, but to build a lot of them," he said. "The couple of years that preceded the pandemic, our mind and attention was on expansion."
Everything changed when the COVID-19 pandemic started in March 2020, Snyder said.
The restaurant temporarily closed from June-August 2020 and used the time to renovate the location on Prospect Street to keep employees safe from the virus. But the negativity directed at service industry workers was exhausting, Snyder said, and two of the five full-time employees left in December 2020.
"We continued to stumble along, but never really got even back to where we were," he said. "We couldn’t get to the point where we were open as much as we wanted to be."
He tired to hire more people, it was difficult to hire the type of people he wants, Snyder said. Although he was able to hire one person, all the full-time employees are ready to move on now and have accepted other jobs.
"And suddenly it’s just me. It’s just me and I can’t do it (alone). It just can’t be done," he said.
While the employees have accepted new jobs, Snyder said they will stay with SteamRoller until the final day the restaurant is open—and some old friends may stop by as well.
"I’m keeping a number of people that used to work there updated right now as to what looks like it will be officially the last day because a number of them want to come in and just work it for nostalgia’s sake and see it off," he said.
Snyder said over the seven years the business has been open, the crew members have become like family.
"I think it’s the greatest triumph of the whole thing to have lost a lot of employees but never lost a friend," he said.
Ideally, Snyder said he would like to sell the business. And if not, then sell the assets.
"I still think that the right person can make a go of this," he said. "As I said in the (Facebook) post, I don’t really have the energy to be that person anymore."
From there, if he is not able to sell the business, Snyder said he’ll pursue leasing out the building, which he owns. He wants to make sure the building is used by someone who is excited to use the space.
"A lot of it for me is, you know, being a good caretaker, not just for the building and my own finances, but for the community at large," he said.
Snyder still owns the food truck that started it all and he said he is including that in the sale of the business.
"The whole business is just something that we’re wrapping up. (The food truck) was a fantastic way to start, but it started as that with the ambition of something else and the restaurant started as that with the ambition of something else." he said. "I personally am really looking forward to finding the next thing to be really ambitious about."
mdevito@gannett.com
740-607-2175
Twitter: @MariaDeVito13
This article originally appeared on Newark Advocate: SteamRoller Bagel Sandwiches closing after five years in Granville
