Owner explains why longtime Lexington pizza restaurant is closing after 15 years
A Lexington pizza restaurant, Brick Oven Pizzeria, has closed after 15 years in business.
The family owned restaurant at 4379 Old Harrodsburg Road, announced the closing on its Facebook page.
“Attention Brick Oven Customers: We have some unfortunate news… Brick Oven will be closing down this week. Most likely permanently. Today will be the last day we are open to the public. Come visit and hang out tonight!”
The restaurant’s website was updated to confirm a permanent closure effective July 10, and added: “Thank you for all of your support over the years.”
The restaurant, located in the South Elkhorn Village shopping center just off of Harrodsburg Road, was owned by Michael Kolenda, who worked closely with his son, Tim Kolenda, who served as the manager, and his other children.
Michael Kolenda died two years ago, leaving the business to his six children.
“All of the recipes that are in that store are original, nothing came out of a book,” Michael’s daughter, Kara Kolenda, said. “Nobody knows those recipes, even the dough has a secret recipe that Tim invented.”
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the pizzeria was able to stay open and serve not only the community but also its employees.
“He never opted to close his doors,” Kara said. “Everything that was legally allowed, we did it. He never let one single employee go unpaid through COVID. He made it last.”
For 11 of the 15 years that Brick Oven Pizzeria was open, it had been in a smaller space located in the same plaza before deciding to relocate to a larger building in the same area the last four years.
“The community helped us stay alive, they would come in and just say, ‘We’re supporting this small business,’ and they would drop big tips to our staff,” Kara said.
After making it through the pandemic and the death of their father, his children worked to find solutions to keep the business afloat, citing struggles with rent negotiation and staff retention.
“Hiring was so difficult because they had some COVID assistance happening behind the scenes so their paychecks weren’t their only source of income,” Kara said. “We had a high no-show rate of our employees, and therefore our business suffered because of that.”
The rising price of supplies also proved to be a struggle for the pizzeria as it became harder to obtain products that it depended on. Kara said that despite inflation, they tried to not raise prices in the restaurant.
While the decision to close the pizzeria had been a long time coming, the announcement was not made to the public until the last minute.
“We did not make the announcement to our customers because we wanted to stay open,” Kara said. “We were looking every minute right up to closing for options and ways that we could stay open.”
Kara said she and her siblings tried to sell the business and were in negotiation with potential buyers, but wanted to keep the ownership local and were untimely unable to sell it.
“We had our UK game crowd, our NFL crowd and our happy hour crowd and we just loved every single one of those groups of people and we got to know most of them by name,” Kara Kolenda said. “They weren’t just our customers, they were our friends and we will miss that very much.”
This story was originally published July 11, 2024 at 2:58 PM.
