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Is Roberta's Selling Out To A Billionaire?
By
Rebecca Fishbein
Published May 28, 2016
Modified May 28, 2016
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By
Rebecca Fishbein
Published May 28, 2016
Modified May 28, 2016
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Roberta's has been Bushwick's star since opening in 2008, earning both accolades from the highbrow culinary world for its pizzas and points from clientele for its hip scene. But Bushwick has changed a lot over the last eight years, and so has Roberta's, transforming into an empire complete with Clintons and frozen pizzas. Now, it appears a billionaire's investing in Roberta's, and while OG staffers and fans think it's The End, the end of what is not quite clear.
Eater reports that Michael Tisch—of the Tisch family, responsible for the Tisch School of the Arts, the Tisch Children's Zoo in Central Park, and NYU Langone's Tisch Hospital, etc.—plans to invest heavily in Roberta's. The restaurant's owners plan to use the funds to open new Roberta's-related ventures, like a steakhouse. They also intend to renovate the current space, jazzing up the charmingly rickety tiki bar in Roberta's backyard and expand the kitchen's physical space.
Co-owner and chef Carlo Mirarchi says Tisch has no plans to rip out Roberta's heart and replace it with a cash register. "We have done such minimal improvements to this place because we've kind of just done it so haphazardly," Mirarchi told Eater. "So there are certain things we're excited about improving. All these things are going to make this place better. I don't see how adding another Rational oven to the kitchen is a loss of character." But employees are apparently freaking out—apparently 20 or more staff members have left over the past few months over concerns that the working environment will go from loose and creative to strict and corporate.
It's true that a job is a job and not all of them can be fun and cool, but when such a job attracts and supports likeminded, creative people, it is a bummer when they start doing things like installing time clocks, hiring a real HR department, and turning the ramshackle home you built into a moneymaking machine. Waiting tables and hostessing can be fulfilling on its own sometimes, but what really makes a more or less menial job worthwhile is the work environment and the folks you work with—a staff at a place like Roberta's feels more like a family and less like a "concept" with a billionaire-fronted cash flow.
Still, Roberta's (potentially) going corporate doesn't feel all that different from when Williamsburg got a Starbucks. The restaurant hasn't been a hip local spot in years. I went to Roberta's on Christmas Eve in 2012 and it was totally empty—when I went back on Christmas Eve the following year, there was a two-hour wait and Manhattanites were pulling up in town cars.
“It was a little bit of a shock to come back after three years and have to do things like clock in and out and read through an employee handbook, but places grow and change and don't stay like a startup forever,” Dave Colon, a former employee who returned for a brief stint earlier this year, told us.
And Roberta's, as it stands, has had to fight for its survival. Mirarchi and co-founder Brandon Hoy have been engaged in a lengthy legal battle with former owner Chris Parachini; they've been sued for wage theft, and last year they apparently owed the government $480K in combined corporate and sales tax. A lax work environment is fun, but a business is a business, and it needs to make money. The Roberta's of 2008 was always doomed, so to speak.
The restaurant has not yet responded to request for comment, and it's unclear when and if any of these big changes are set to go down. The deal with Tisch is still being negotiated, according to Eater, but based on the info we do have, your waitress will probably be clothed next time you dine on a Bee Sting.
Tagged
brooklyn
bushwick
pizza
roberta's
tisch
Rebecca Fishbein
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