Help Save O'Henry's Publick House

O’Henry’s Publick House is a life long dream come true. We signed our lease in October 2016. It has been a labor of love, time and money building the space out from a vanilla box (raw space.) We did this on a shoestring budget without taking loans or credits. We made our dreams a reality and finally, at the end January 2020, O'Henry's was launched. Unfortunately, in March Covid-19 hit shortly after our opening as we were just starting to build up our business and see return customers and secure party bookings suddenly everything came crashing to a halt. We were forced to close due to government regulations and only opened to feed the frontline workers because we still wanted to give back and help others. We were not approved for grants and loans. When we thought there was a light at the end of the tunnel and that we could open-up with outdoor dining and the promise that indoor dining would soon follow, none of these promises materialized for months. Finally, they announced 25% capacity indoors, which for us amounts to only 18 people. We have consistently followed all the rules and guidelines because we believe in safety first. Our employees are very important to us, they are family. We always put them first and make sure they get paid before anyone else.  Our main goal is to keep them employed. They remain loyal throughout this pandemic and give so much of themselves to help us.They have families and bills to pay which is becoming more difficult for them with reduced hours. Thank God we have had a wonderful landlord through all this who has helped us out more than we could ever ask for and for that we are eternally grateful. However, we have not been able to build up the business to what it was becoming because of the pandemic which we completely sympathize with. Another shutdown is imminent and we are concerned we will not make it through the winter. The rules keep changing, we built barriers, they changed the requirements and had to redo them. We have put tents for the comfort of our customers, they keep getting destroyed by the weather. We have already gone through 7 tents and we cannot afford to replace them again, which means we will not be able to continue with outdoor dining except on very warm days. When indoor dining was announced we invested a substantial amount of money to retrofit the space according to the regulations and now we're being told we'll have to close again. The government has turned it back on small business and at this point we can only turn to the community. This is where the only hope lies. We have no other option. When we come out of this on the flip side, we will have a grand reopening party with all our supporters to show our appreciation and give back like you gave to us. Thank you for your support! Here's to a better tomorrow! Cheers! With much gratitude, Bobby Digi and Lisa McFarland and the entire staff of O'Henry's Publick House