Where are all the red umbrellas?
This is Le P'tit Paris at lunchtime today. Closed? Gone? Another one bites the dust?
posted by Tom Falco at 1:30 PM
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33 Comments:
That landlord is know to be ruthless and unforgiving with rents.He charges a ridiculous amount during these times for a location he thinks is great when honestly it is no better half way down the street. Many of those retailers are very behind on rents and he wont even budge. Guess he likes empty storefronts. Guess he must get some kinda perk from taxes that way. Really sad. All those empty storefronts are affecting all the rest of our businesses
Wow!
Wow! It seems like no restaurant can survive in that location.
I wasn't a fan of the place (mediocre, overpriced food - Le Bouchon has better breakfast) but maybe they are just closed for the holidays?
How are we doing with this "Vision" thing so far?
It's only going to get worse, a lot worse!
I know, Iknow, stick with the same lame gameplan. Marc knows best.
WAKE UP GROVE RESIDENTS, your village is flatlining.
You're cutting the very branch you're sitting on!!
I talk to many business owners in the Grove. And a lot of complaints I get are about landlords etc.
Marc aint perfect but its ridiculous for everyone to point the finger whenever the weather turns bad. There is a lot of problems but lets focus on them, if not you sound ridiculous, you burn bridges and no one will listen to you.
That being said I hated that place the Grove has a ton of French places.
With the extortion money paid to MPA every month is it any wonder any restaurant can afford to remain open? The rents are less than the MPA extortion fees.
Had dinner at Cocowalk this past Saturday and walked around afterwards on Commondore Plaza and Main Highway. Don't think I've seen the Grove in such bad shape with so many shuttered storefronts. The nicest, brightest area was Cocowalk, with little else going on anywhere....
It's aready begun...
Here comes all the assholes out of the woodwork now stating how horrible each and every restaurant that has gone under on Commodore Plaza was.
In the last two weeks Havanna grove, Citas and now La Petit Paris.
Not to mention Commodore's bigest retail Mark at IOS has gone from 3 stores to 1.
It's going to take %75 of our businesses to fail before these idiot activists admit that they're wrong.
Sorry, we can't afford to wait for your crusty old asses to finally get the point.
It's crunch time folks!!!
I never liked Le P'tit Paris all that much... are you sure it isn't just closed for the holidays? Though that does seem unlikely...
Business & money go hand in hand. But I was here beginning 1965 and business was not exactally money, money, money. To a degree yes, but not "the" factor that made the Grove what many of you make reference to when you say that someone is killing the Grove. The Grove had character and a "certain" charm. There were many, many individual characters and watering holes. Men could meet women and visa versa, man meet man and girls meet girls and everything in between. There was music, alcohol and more, but what's was important was the potential of contact and real characters and it did not necessarily translate into the dollar sign. All sorts of businesses are closing all over the world daily----the only thing missing in the Grove is real character/action/activity and it's not anyones particular fault. If the Grove had character individuals and families would visit and spend their bucks. And it doesn't make practical sense to
always infer that us Grovites are letting down Grove Businesses by not frequenting Grove establishments. It's just a simple straight forward recession.
what was in that space before?
also I've heard from EVERYONE who ate at l'ptit that food & service were terrible. still makes me upset to see more and more places dying off.
people forget if the commercial center dies, their property values will plummet.
either we put our feet down now, or watch the neighborhood die.
If you ever ate there, the food was mediocre, the service sucked.
THAT'S why they're out of business. Just look accross the street and see that a well run restaurant does just fine.
Really!! I thought "across the street" was doing crappy also, face it all those half off deals, etc. is a clear example of how bad business is!!
I live in the Grove and dine often in the Grove, but the food and service here were so bad that I only went twice. On the other hand, I've been dining at Greenstreet Cafe for years. No rocket science needed to figure out why this restaurant is shuttered.
Wow. I love how some just refuse to see the writing on the walls. They continue to say, "that place just didn't know what they were doing", "it was poorly run", "the service and food were subpar", etc. Anything but admit that the grove is just not busy enough to support the cost of doing business here.
It's going to get worse before it gets better. No one will open a business there anytime soon, and there's going to be 5 closed up fronts for every open business soon.
The bad part is that the economy is doing better. The recession is over. Investors are looking for opportunities, BUT THAT MONEY'S NOT COMING TO THE GROVE. Only an idiot would open in the grove right now.
Hope you fogies enjoy your peace and quiet, because there's lot's of it on the way.
Coconut Grove, Fall 2010 - Sarnoff's vision shall be realized:
http://billwardwriter.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/tumbleweed-300x265.jpg
Anon 2:33PM
There's only one person in this town who writes so incoherantly.
Jobie, please continue to baffel us all with your words of wisdom.
Your attempt to go anon is as subtle as all the empty storefronts.
I think you dropped a few too many hits of acid back in the Grove's hayday. I actually like reading your ridiculous rants.
It gives me a good chuckle and helps me to forget how bad things are around here.
Your turn...
I see alot of pointing fingers on this blog. "Its the landlord, no its the police!" Please folks get a grip, thousands of businesses around the country are closing turn on the news, the economy isnt doing so well.
I have to admit I prefer GreenStreet to Le P'tit Paris. I am sadden to see another restaurant bite the dust but they were over priced. Although perhaps they were over priced because the rent being charged was over priced or inflated. But I do love the service at GreenStreet that is for sure.
all you jackasses keep mentioning Greenstreet.
Why don't you "in the know" people go ask Silvano how his numbers are in comparison to a year and a half ago?
He'll tell you his bar business is down a whopping %50!
I know, I know... He's still making money.
Who the f#@k are you people to tell him that he's making enough $$$?
Ask him if he's for bringing back the same operating hours as the rest of the city and he'll give you an astounding yes!
The owner would always sit a table and Never smile or make it comfortable for us to have a wonderful lunch. He would never make eye contact with us. What a total losser this guy was. The location is great, and it will not be empty long......I hope. Know any Chinese restaurant owners?
Sailfast, why would you call the owner Regis a "losser" whatever that means?
What is it that you do for a living
pray tell? You alway have some sort of critique on just about everything on this blog.
From what I've heard you need to do a little house cleaning of your own.
People in glass houses.....
To Anonymous comment right above. HAPPY HOLIDAYS HO HO HO.......
Hi every grovites. I'm shirley the owner of le p'tit paris too.,i'd like to say that i agree on the fact that we had a hard start. I mean to find the right team on the floor and kitchen. Our mistake ! Ok.sorry to all tp haven't be able to pleased you... Btw a lot of our cluents regular and lovely most of them not from the grove except a few, gave us a chance few month after and they did not regret at all, we welcome them w/ a lots of good and smile. The probleme w/ u guys is that u are hypocrit and smiling in front but as soon as we turn our back you throw the knife and your snakes! Instead to keep your walking distance restzurants ushould tell right away in front what u didn't like to help them to improve and create a relation. To tell tje truth we are planning to leave away from the grove YES!! Soon very very soon. Because of the mentality of most of grovites and the dying Grove. We came to the grove we invest 700k + we tried our best but it's not enough so yes we gonna see somewhere else if the sky is more beautiful.
I and Regis would like to thanks our great and nuce clients , most of the business owner even our competitors( greenstreet, george's, le bouchon, ludo , ugo di roma, avance , ios etc etc) but in particular john and kim from Moe's , our friends, and specially our team which is w us since almost the first day.
Enjoy
shirley
ps: excuse the english mistakes as most of u know my name is english but I'm really french. .,,
Shirley again
i forgot to say Happy Hollydays. And if someone want to come to see me and talk around a bite I'll be there
best regards
Hey Shirley,
You should check out your yelp page for honest feedback from your customers
http://www.yelp.com/biz/le-ptit-paris-coconut-grove
If you want honest feedback, there it is. You are still in a great position/location to succeed, no one wants your place to leave, they just expect the same caliber product/service that we get from other french restaurants nearby.
I agree w/ u but we can't pleased 100% .. and btw it's always complain about cheap bfast never on the foie gras or filet mignon rossini or seabass. Only people who spend 7 dollars for eggs and 2 for an american coffee are complaining. And I don' know why yelp people should be more objective than grovites... And ur one of the yelp people too. I'd like to know wgat u do as job. Just to let u know that our kitchen people were bruno the formal chef of george's and the other one is keith who used to be 2 nd chef at le bouchon and the last at Cristabelle.... But u know what Brian ? Come at le p'tit on wednesday or friday or even on we , order what u want eat then present urself and i'll invit u if u really did not enjoyed it. Fair enough?
Dear all,
First of all, to stop all rumors, we'll go out of business by January 4th. Up to that date, we'll be open almost each night and all day long on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.
Even if the business slow down a little bit, the only reason we go out, is for very, very serious health trouble for one of us (Regis or Shirley) confirmed last Friday by doctors. By consequence, we do not have any other choice. We need quite time, not compatible (at all...) with business restaurant.
For 18 months, it has been a pleasure to serve you all. Thanks to our partners (Louis and HL), all our team, managers (Fab & Jean Charles), our Chef, Keith (which is serving food in coconut for about 20years), Magali (2nd Chef), our main waiters (Laurent, Pablo, Both Murat, Sergio, Aida, John, the list should be too long...), and all our dishwashers.
You all can't imagine how theses guys has been devoted to please you !.
Thanks to all our competitors such as John and Kim, Sylvanno, George Eric, Bruno & Christian for their support and advice.
Thanks to "real" local customers such as Barbara and Karl, Carlos and his family, John, David, David & Patricia, Frankie Lopez and his family, commissioner Sarnoff and his lovely wife,Richard, David Pujas, Nanny, Claudia, Laurie from Biscayne Bank, to name a few...and of course all the French crew (Bernard, Nico, Rodolphe, Francois, Sophie, Momo, Fred et Nathalie from Nikita Sunset, Laure and her Kids, Sylvie, etc, etc,... we love you all.
Thanks for the good time we shared.
I read a comment about our landlord: there's no reason to blame him. Hakki is a real straight nice guy, a "word" gentleman, helped us a lot during this period. I can't see any link between him, and the fact that the traffic has been divided by 4 or 5 in the last year in Coconut Grove!! If we are not able to keep alive a Banana Republic, or Barnes & nobles, Multi millions Chains Restaurants, movie theaters, convention center, night clubs, bars, etc, etc... how do you want to attract huge brands such as Apple, or tourists, or regional people ???
I'm not surprised about getting bad comments about our restaurant, or food, or service, or the fact that the bathroom are by the end of the corridor...With an average of 2500 covers a week, by math, some customers, got at one moment bad service, or a missed plate, or something, whatever you don't like...
By the way, at least, we brought some life in the Grove, jobs, taxes, investment, heart, love, which is, to us, the most important thing we need all right now!
For me, the problem is not about to know if mussels are better at Le bouchon, or George's or at Le P'tit Paris?? just a question of taste, mood, or ambiance. For sure, as every business owners knows, if Coconut grove continue to decline that fast, we'll have 3 places to eat..not that much..no confusion about where will be the best mussels!! What about the credibility when an anonymous or Bryan talking about our product and says basically "but I've never been there - I heard "! ii could be French humor man…
By reading all theses comments, for some of you (most are anonymous...), I'd love to see you at work or running your businesses, to enjoy the perfect way you are, and passionate about perfection you are...
Thanks Tom for your passion and devotion for the Grove. You don't need to apologize the way you did by email about your articles today. It's done anyway!
Again, most, most important things we have to worry about now.
All my best - Happy holidays :)
Regis Ducatillon
Closed? Gone? Another one bites the dust? All followed by question marks. Obviously the Grape was asking a question. Is it the Grape's fault a few folks can't grasp the Grape was wanting to know if anyone had an answer.
I remember when the Grape and I were looking at the Anoka, same thing, even worse. No tables, no chairs, no nothing. There was sign stating "PROPERTY AVAILABLE". So the Grape printed something similar and the owner commented on the Grape blog that he was not closed and berated the blog for stating so-----but, Anoka never opened its doors or fired up their grills again.
I don't blame the landlord or the economy. I live in the grove, frequent the restaurants, and gave le petite 4 chances and was disappointed each time. It will be nice to get something new at that great location, and this is long overdue...
Anon 2:33, Hey, dim witted, subject matter "Le P'tet Paris" da!
Businesses come and go, we're in a recession, normal stuff for a recession-----but it's nice to know you're paying attention to me! The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about at all.
Anon 12:44, respectfully, looking for a sincere answer. Why did you go back a 2'd, 3'd & 4th time? I.E., nice look, red environment, nice uniforms, the owners were friends, didn't like Greenstreet, wanted to support a new business------what?
I am disappointed like most of us that another Grove restaurant is closing, but I concur with most: the service was not good, and the pricing didn't justify the average food. Greenstreet isn't the greatest food, but it's good enough, the service is top-notch, and the bill (while not cheap) is reasonable -- all in an excellent location. That's why they are crowded. Ditto George's du Grove: not the greatest food, but Georges welcomes you like you're VIP, great ambience, good service. Result? Georges does very well.
Crazy Piano's will bite the dust, I was there recently and it was dead. Why? Great ambience, good location and concept, but below-average American food, and ridiculously expensive prices.
Not a lot of rocket science here.
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