WARRENSVILLE HEIGHTS, Ohio — According to the National Restaurant Association, 2023 has been serving as a critical year for restaurant owners in hopes of recovering from various challenges like rising costs to hiring people to work.
But one black-owned restaurant tells News 5 they’ve survived and are still going strong more than 80 years later.
“It’s what we are,” said Whitmore’s Co-Owner, Vance Whitmore.
Whitmore says Whitmore’s Bar-B-Que isn’t just serving up delicious meals on a plate.
“We want to make sure that we always have a consistent product. We want to give them what my granddad and my father taught us to give them,” said Whitmore.
He and his brother Virgil Whitmore are also keeping their community’s souls fed.
“They serve us. We serve them. We love each other,” said Virgil Whitmore.
Located on Harvard Road in Warrensville Heights, Whitmore’s Bar-B-Que has been around for more than 80 years, and the business says it’s more than just their secret sauce that keeps people coming back.
“The fact that we believe our community is important to us, and we also want to be here for them. We know really one of the most significant things we can do is allow them to get comfort from what they’re able to take in,” said Whitmore.
During a time, when we’ve seen how the pandemic and now the post-pandemic era have impacted local restaurants due to staffing challenges and people working from home, Consumer Expert Teresa Murray says it’s not often you see a place like Whitmore’s Bar-B-Que still standing.
“I mean, 80 years. All kinds of businesses don't have that kind of longevity, especially where you're talking about multigeneration,” said Teresa Murray, who’s a Consumer Watchdog for the US Public Interest Research Group.
Even before the pandemic, Murray says the restaurant business is one of the toughest industries for owners.
“The National Restaurant Association says that only about 20% of restaurants make it long term, so usually that's pretty much defined as five years,” said Murray.
But Murray believes local restaurants will survive if the owners make themselves a part of the community, which Vance Whitmore says is happening at their business.
“We just continue to spend time here in the restaurant, making sure that people got exactly what we as Whitmore’s wanted to give them,” said Whitmore.
Along their journey, the black-owned business admits there have been some bumps in the road.
But they reassure this one very important message:
News 5’s Remi Murrey asked: You guys aren’t going out of business anytime?
“No,” they both said. “When you can kind of be the one and only of one of the few, then you probably have a better shot at making it, and that’s kind of what we are in Cleveland.”
