With the additional restrictions put in place this week by the Provincial government, dine-in restaurants in our community are undoubtedly going to suffer further loses, or make the tough decision to close their doors. Stittsville resident Mike Labreche (AKA Skippy) is genuinely concerned for the future of our local establishments. Not only because he is part-owner of two Kanata restaurants – Crazy Horse and Central Bierhaus – but for the ‘Mom and Pop’ run eateries.
We at Stittsville Central reached out to Mike to hear his story and help by sharing his message. Having seen his own restaurants take a decline, “over the past 10 months I have watched our business shrink to almost nothing“. Restaurants are already struggling and these restrictions are an added problem faced by most restaurant owners – “it costs more to open than what the orders for only take-out can cover“.
Mike has taken personal heartfelt action and told us, “from the goodness of my heart, I want to assist local restaurants by starting a GoFundMe campaign to provide some relief to the owners”. He has heard first-hand the sad stories, but has also had the loyal support of people wanting to help out over and above the take-out option in place, but they just didn’t know how.
From this vocal support, he was inspired to start his GoFundMe campaign. Mike set a goal of $50,000 from which 10 (dine-in only) Stittsville and Kanata restaurants would receive $5,000 each. He originally saw the idea in the States and thought that it could work here too.
Mike plans to run the campaign for one month for now, but this could change should he reach his goal sooner. All the donations are well documented and he has asked restaurants in the Stittsville/Kanata area to reach out by email to enter their name mikelabreche@hotmail.com.
To assist our local restaurants, you can donate to the GoFundMe campaign by visiting the page here. On his GoFundMe page, Mike says, “I feel it’s the right thing to try to do and help our/my community”. That is the same sincere feeling that this editor heard in Mike’s voice during our conversation.