(04-16-2024 07:57 AM)Big Red Wrote: (04-16-2024 07:47 AM)HawaiiToNIU Wrote: (04-16-2024 07:45 AM)Big Red Wrote: (04-16-2024 06:55 AM)NIUfilmmaker Wrote: https://www.shawlocal.com/daily-chronicl...own-dekalb
Sucks to lose a cool microbrewery in the heart of downtown, lets hope another upscale pub seemlessly takes it's place
Dekalb needs to right it's ship, can't say enough how important getting the school back over 20k is, getting students back into the housing intended for students, etc..
Freeman has to go ASAP.
Kind of surprised. A good crowd in there every time I was there. But I will say one thing, we NEVER had good service. We were there on a slow day and a busy day and each time, our food order took forever to get to us. Once we had to change the order to "to go" because it took so long and we were almost late to the thing we were out there for in the first place.
But I've also been to their location in Ottawa and had absolutely no problems with service there.
Micro Breweries are a tough business nowadays. The market got a little oversaturated with them, after a boom in the 2010s.
I wasn't feeling too bad, because I thought there were some other microbreweries in DeKalb. But upon further research, they all closed too. No more Forge, Byers and now no Keg and Kernel.
I didn't know Byers had closed. It was a neat place. I did hear that Forge in Sycamore closed.
Well, now there's an opening. I've always felt a coffee shop downtown would be good. Specifically a roaster.
Anyway, regarding a brewery. I bet Byers couldn't compete with K&K and now they end up closing too. TR might have over-extended themselves with 4 locations. Maybe a new one will open. IMO, any brewery downtown DeKalb needs to serve food or it won't last. People (craft beer drinkers) will travel to try new places but not repeatedly if there isn't food to 1) bring them back and 2) keep them there.
I'm not sure what it's like out in DeKalb County but I know breweries having a time in Cook with all the red tape and loops to jump through and the ever increasing cost of licenses just to operate. Seems like a county like DeKalb would look to those things as a way to get people and businesses out there.
Feel free to add in things you were fond of. This is from my time between 2006-2011. I took an extra year because I like to party.
Here's a personal list of things that have closed that upset me. I have fond memories of these places:
The entire Hillcrest Mall...I used to get cheap meat to bbq from the Mexican grocery store
Campus Cinemas... Movies so cheap
Otto's and the Underground... The Underground was cool
Illini Tire...pure nostalgia
Huskies Pizza...$3.75 a slice and a pop
Bacci's Pizza
The Smoothie Place... It became F&Js Hot Dogs then later Lukulos
Lukulos...not because it was good, but for nostalgia
Rapp Daddy's Fried Chicken... It was excellent
Tom & Jerry's... Best drunk food
The House Cafe
The VCB...I worked there and I liked their apparel selection
Great Wall Chinese... It was a vibe
O'Leary's
The Hillside
Eduardo's
Sunshine Scoops
Shelley's
The Pita Place next to Shelley's
Lundeen's... Seriously, how does a liquor store close in a college town?!?!? I guess Thirsty's got looted, so maybe that's why they left but still operate locations elsewhere
Starbusters... This place was always packed as I recall, how the hell did it close?
Reilly's
El Famous Burrito
Johnny's Charhouse
Ruby Tuesday