New Orleans restaurant closes

Just a couple of years ago, New Orleans Riverfront Restaurant in West Columbia would serve 400 to 500 people on an average Saturday night. In recent months, that number has tapered off to about 100.

Last Saturday, owner Maria Kokolis-Lashway, 43, made the decision to close effective immediately the cajun restaurant she built and opened 13 years ago with her father, Tony Kokolis."It just got to the point Saturday where, if we stay open another week, we're not going to make payroll," she said.

Kokolis-Lashway blamed the economy, which is just emerging from a two-year recession, for forcing her hand.

Sales at the restaurant that sits on the banks of the Congaree River have been down for about a year, she said. Also, businesses that normally threw Christmas parties couldn't this year because they also are struggling, she said.

"Usually, December will pull you out of the hole," she said.

The restaurant's closing is a "tremendous loss to the community," said C. Grant Jackson, senior vice president for community development of the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce.

"I don't believe that we have another restaurant that serves dinner with a river view," he said.

The location, which also offers a view of Columbia, is a prime piece of property for development, Jackson said.

"It's just a great ambiance," he said.

The property has been on the market for two months for between $1.8 million and $2 million, Kokolis-Lashway said. She said she had hoped that an investor would buy the restaurant and that she could lease it and continue to operate.

The property also is zoned for a hotel or condominiums, Kokolis-Lashway said. She said a few people have looked at the property, but she does not have any offers.

"I would love nothing more than to see somebody step in and put another restaurant here," she said.

The location also would be good for an office building or condos with a restaurant and retail on the bottom level, Jackson said.

The restaurant will not be able to honor outstanding gift certificates, said Kokolis-Lashway, who has been in the restaurant business since she was 12, starting out at the family's previous venture, Zorba's. The family no longer owns that restaurant.

"We have 40 people that just lost jobs," she said, including students and single mothers and some employees who have been there for more than a decade.

"It's a bad situation all the way around."

This story was originally published January 20, 2010 at 12:00 AM with the headline "New Orleans restaurant closes."