Late last year, things were looking up for Meir Maslavi, owner of popular eatery Miro Café in SoHo. After rents for his 474 Broadway location tripled to near $300 a square foot, Mr. Maslavi was able to ink a much cheaper deal a few blocks south, for $100 a square foot at 400 Broadway. His other Miro Café, at 594 Broadway, remained in operation.
But construction delays coupled with the recession cooked the restaurateur’s plans for the new eatery, which has yet to open. Late last week, Miro Café, under the corporate entity Adir M. Corp., filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The filing cited assets between $50,000 and $100,000, and liabilities ranging from $500,000 to $1 million.
Mr. Maslavi now owes money to more than a dozen creditors, including Queens-based Bartlett Dairy & Food Service and cupcake shop Crumbs. Bartlett is currently still supplying the Miro Café with dairy products, as it has been for over nine years, and is currently owed $9,000, according to the filing. Iron King Construction Inc., which is based in Brooklyn, is owed $280,000.
Neither Mr. Maslavi nor his attorney, Lawrence Morrison of Meister Seelig & Fein, returned calls requesting comment.
The Chapter 11 filing of Miro Café follows bankruptcies of many other New York eateries, such as Tailor in SoHo and Amy Ruth’s in Harlem. While some have used the protection to restructure and renegotiate lease contracts, others, like Frederick’s Madison on the Upper East Side, eventually closed.
“They have the chance to be very lean and streamlined, but there’s only so far you can go, and that’s what Chapter 11 is for, to reorganize,” said Clark Wolf, who runs an eponymous restaurant consulting business. “If they can trim down, they’ll come back stronger, later.”
Traditionally, restaurants close at the beginning of the year, in January and February, after reviewing the books from the previous year. But this year, Mr. Wolf estimates that the majority of restaurants will close in late September or early October.
“They just don’t have enough to get through the holiday season,” he said.
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