Za'Atar Shawarma & Pizza at 8021 Wisconsin Avenue in Bethesda has closed. Signage has been removed from inside the front windows, which are now obscured. The restaurant only opened three months ago. Replacing Cheesy Pizzi, which closed last August, Za'Atar is the latest victim of Montgomery County's moribund economy and anti-business climate.
20 comments:
Robert, On October 15, 2025 you wrote, "Za'Atar Shawarma & Pizza is opening at 8021 Wisconsin Avenue in downtown Bethesda. Their menu will feature Middle Eastern cuisine and artisanal pizza. The restaurant will replace Cheesy Pizzi, which closed in August. Work is underway inside the space" [emphasis mine] https://robertdyer.blogspot.com/2025/10/zaatar-shawarma-pizza-opening-in.html
If they can't last even four months, is it possible there might be something else at play, rather than the old whipping horse of moribundity?
12:39: Or you could turn that around and say that the economy is so moribund, and the policies of the County Council so anti-business, that a new restaurant couldn't survive three months (they opened late November). Anecdotally, there has been a modest increase in the number of businesses that close after only a few months in MoCo over the last two years.
3 Middle eastern/mediterranean pizza type places have failed in that location. Maybe a small Irish Pub would do better.
Or Robert, the other possibility, is, like quite a few others, it was garbage and/or cuisine that the immediate area wasn't remotely interested in. If a place is truly great, people find out about it and beat the door down.
Doubling down?
So, the same way any crime report reported here immediately becomes chum for commenters criticizing Democrats, any business failure reported here automatically gets chalked up to moribundity?
We could assume it was garbage, but we would be wrong, as the online reviews were overwhelmingly positive.
Imagine a single media outlet that does not subscribe to the idea that our corrupt and inept elected officials deserve a participation trophy of praise and admiration for totally blowing their job while collecting a six figure salary and regularly kicking their constituents in the privates - you are so correct to be outraged! One critical voice in Montgomery County - this is a travesty! We must be uniform and unanimous in praise of our Dear Leaders no matter how spectacular the failure!
I wasn't saying that any level of crime is acceptable, or that it's easy for businesses to survive in Montgomery County, or that the County's elected officials are perfect (or even close to it).
But aren't you, and many of the commenters here, jumping to conclusions, and to place blame, any time a crime, or a business failure, is reported here?
Maybe the local regulations on businesses were at least partly responsible for this particular establishment's closing down after only a few months.
But attributing it to that automatically, and apparently without doing any further research or inquiry, is simply lazy. For any kind of "media outlet."
In this case I would say it's a victim of too many pizza places.
Too many middle eastern places too.
I thought that entire block was being developed or has that one stalled too.
Could have been any of these reasons. I never noticed/recalled) it was there as well.
7:51 - Robert said the online reviews were good. Something isn't adding up. That entire corridor is a drive-by and very few do well along that stretch of Wisconsin. Ave. Trader Joe's is an exception. They have the national reputation over decades so they could open almost anywhere. Lastly, it's not a good idea to have your name be two totally didn't cuisines because it confuses people and they won't stop to try.
NO PUB FOR YOU!
When you close after three months you didn't have enough initial capital to stay open. A small business, with seemingly no marketing plan, has to have enough money to survive at least 6 months without making a profit. I pass by that location almost every day and I didn't know it was open. The U.S. is also in the mist of a cultural change where office jobs have become work from home jobs. Many of the offices in that area are vacant.
Robert asserts the county’s anti-business environment being responsible for this closure, despite providing no evidence particular to this case —i.e. the owner reported county’s [insert program/rule here] caused his biz to go under. I’ve decided the place closed because of ICE raids. Like Robert’s awareness of bad-for-business laws and rules in the county, I know that immigration program can have a deleterious effect on small businesses, although, again like Robert, I can provide no direct evidence such was the case in this situation.
Robert, none of your readers would dispute but that you provide a valuable service to the community, and that you report —journalism ftw!— on all manner of things that leave us better informed. But in this particular case, do yourself a favor and stop digging. It was journalism to report the closing of this business; it was pure, unadulterated, rank speculation to assert *without having provided any verifiable, specific supporting evidence that confirms the case to be so* that the restaurant shuttered because of county policies.
11:31 - Very well said. The rent is so high that you need to have that cash register ringing all the time just to make monthly bills. No marketing plan is a mistake many make actually not just these folks
The problem is that for every one business closing in Montgomery County, Robert usually talks about 3 opening. The MoCo economy can't be so moribund if you have companies opening literally every day into that same economy.
Or, one could argue that those businesses are significantly more likely to fail here than elsewhere, because of local regulations, demographics, etc.; and that their owners just aren't recognizing, or appreciating, the generally moribund nature of Montgomery County's economy. (Not that I agree with that argument.)
Part of the issue with Downtown Bethesda is that I think the people who live here, as opposed to those who work or visit on the weekends are mostly old retired people who might cook for themselves or not go out late. This is markedly different than Downtown Arlington or even the Downtown Town Center areas in Northern Virginia.
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