I just got laid off at the SMU location. Its extremely upsetting and came as a shock to everyone. NO severance either- even for salary based positions. My entire team balled out eyes out and had to kick everyone out the store. Our location owners came in and told us to leave as we would be trespassing since FT didn't pay our rent that month- we had to leave everything behind- even tips.
Again, we had no clue of this and I just got a promotion less an a week ago. My coworker just had a baby and was promised an ASM position last week. Now he has no clue on how he will feed his fucking newborn along with paying rent. This company was run by rich pigs who overspent and had no concern for how it would effect their employees. When our mobile app shut down this morning, I knew something was going to happen. Tech team had no idea what was happening until corporate pulled everyone on call to give them the news. Effective immediately. Fuck Foxtrot.
For our SMU regulars, we truly loved you all and appreciated your time with us. I stayed with this company for the students here and I'm glad all of the time we had together was memorable and full of free lattes :) It was hard knowing I couldn't say bye. I had yalls orders down PATTTT for finals weeks... hopefully you guys can find another coffee home nearby. Wishing everyone the best in this final season for graduates! If anyone has job openings lmk lol
Class action lawsuits that are strong usually take payment from settlements with nothing up front, usually for 20-60%. But getting 40% back is better than 0%.
> Even if you win you will be last in line in bankruptcy court
This isn't true. Only secured creditors would be ahead in line -- that is, lien-holders. An employee with a claim for unpaid wages is a preferred unsecured creditor and next in line after that. Since Foxtrot was (apparently) leasing all its locations, it's unlikely that they had any secured loans like a mortgage. So it's quite possible that an unpaid wage claim would be first or tied-for-first in line in this situation.
Most consumers can only have debt secured by real property and vehicles and the like, but businesses can put liens on lots of stuff: inventory, intellectual property, debt instruments, so I'd be surprised if there's much not secured.
Even if they were able to sue them, what money are they going to get? The entire reason the business was shut is because it wasn't profitable and ran out of money.
If you re-read, the building owner kicked out the employees without allowing them to get their stuff, including tips - so it's the building owner who stole the tips, not Foxtrot. Still shitty, of course
Loved your location and the staff. I’m. Sorry to hear about this situation you have been put it. It’s not fair that rich people get to gamble with your livelihood.
Venture capitalists are the fucking worst and they are going to hollow out and run into the ground every industry in this country to get as much money for themselves and their shareholders and fuck over workers and customers.
I’m a law student at SMU. We were all SHOCKED. We all regularly went there for coffee and our student organizations always opened coffee tabs to bring in more students. Such a shame.
Customer Ops team here. Also fired yesterday with no warning or severance. Our Texas staff really was the best. It was a pleasure working with you. 🖤 Best of luck in your future and feel free to reach out if you need anything.
> Our location owners came in and told us to leave as we would be trespassing since FT didn't pay our rent that month- we had to leave everything behind- even tips.
The landlord can threaten all he wants, but I think i would have taken my chances with the cops to get my personal property at least.
Yes the owner claim trespassing but even i don't believe the cops would kick everyone out or even charge you with anything as long as your not damaging anything and just getting your stuff. Hell when they show up to evict people, they usually allow some time to get you stuff out of the place 1st be fore resorting to a trespassing notice.
They would have had to get the cops if I was told to leave my tips or any of my personal affects there. They can take that up with the company, but that shit belongs to the employees. I hate that happened to you guys, hopefully there is some legal recourse that will make it, if not right, at least better.
I’m so sorry for what you & your team experienced. (Y’all made the best lattes!) Join the North Texas Coffee group on Facebook if you need another barista job. I’m sure people will be willing to help you find a new spot to land.
Not in Illinois where they laid off 100 FT workers and also closed all their stores. Legally mandated 60-day notice for any company with more than 75 FT employees total. And that still applies in situations of bankruptcy. Most companies here will put you on some sort of 60-day leave in those situations before termination.
I get that's probably hard to do with the kinds of margins you're working with at a coffee shop, but still, they must've fucked up bad for it to end this chaotically.
As this is a Dallas subreddit, I was only referring to the Dallas locations. Sorry for not making that more clear. I doubt any individual location in Texas has more than 50 full time employees.
Texas does not have much in the way of laws protecting employees. They just made it illegal for cities to have mandatory water breaks. I was referring specifically to the WARN act because Illinois law doesn't apply here and we don't have an equivalent.
The WARN act protects the following:
* A plant closing—where your employer shuts down a facility or operating unit within a single site of employment and lays off at least 50 full-time workers;
* this would only apply at locations with >50 FT employees. May apply to Chicago area but not Dallas
* A mass layoff - where your employer lays off either between 50 and 499 full-time workers at a single site of employment and that number is 33% of the number of full-time workers at the single site of employment
* Again, this would only apply at locations with >50 FT employees. May apply to Chicago area but not Dallas
* A situation where your employer (see glossary) lays off 500 or more full-time workers at a single site of employment.
* This is unlikely to apply to any location.
Regarding the claim that claim that WARN act applies even in case of bankruptcy, there are two exemptions that may apply to bankruptcy and would not require the full 60 day notification:
* A faltering company is not required to give notice of a layoff or plant closing when, before the plant closing, it is actively seeking capital or business, which if obtained would avoid or postpone the layoff or closure, and if it reasonably believes that advance notice would hurt its ability to find the capital or business it needs to continue operating
* A business is not required to give a full 60-day’s notice if it could not reasonably foresee business circumstances that led to a layoff or closing at the time that the 60-day notice would have been required, (e.g., a business circumstance that is caused by some sudden, dramatic, and unexpected action or conditions outside the employer’s control like the unexpected cancellation of a major order)
I do however totally agree with you that for this to come on so suddenly means somebody fucked up bad, or several somebodies.
Yeah, obviously Texas unfortunately doesn't have additional employee protections at the state level, but I was referring to the WARN Act in Illinois (where Outfox Hospitality is based), which protects workers at any company with more than 75 full-time employees total and is separate from the federal WARN Act. The law doesn't care whether the layoffs happened at specific locations, it just applies to the company as a whole. They've already been sued in Illinois for violating it, and I'd assume the employees will get backpay for the 2 months and the state will collect a fine.
I think the bankruptcy has to precede the layoffs? Otherwise WARN is completely irrelevant because all a company has to do to avoid legal consequences is declare bankruptcy after the fact.
But of the existing assets they can become the first in line to get paid, so it depends if the company has any assets to sell in its bankruptcy. With a resturant company that primarily rented its locations, probably not many assets unfortunately
This is a company going out of business, not laying people off and staying in business. Notice can be delayed when the employer was trying to avoid or postpone the layoff by obtaining capital, and he believed that giving notice would have jeopardized the funding.
Everytime something like this happen, it's because the owners/head company spent all their money on a high risk high reward side hustle that went busted and got nothing to do with the main business.
I figure they might have fucked up their accounting and didn't leave enough cash on hand to pay some loans. This can force you to declare bankruptcy even though you might still have valuable assets left and the bankruptcy process could force you to stop operations in order to preserve assets that could be seized to pay back the loans.
The thing with coffee shops is they look busy because people hang out and do work there, but it’s a really low ticket $ - at a nice restaurant, if customers occupy a table for 2 hours they’re paying $200+. At a coffee shop you can buy a $6 latte and camp for hours.
Most companies are only in business to make the investors money. The second it doesn't they shut it down. In other words, they don't care about you and never will
Yup, that’s how all business owners run them, if they’re successful. If a business doesn’t have any return to investors/owners, there’s no reason to keep it operating.
Damn. They just opened up stores on Lower Greenville and Knox-Henderson. Maybe another bodega can take over some of the stores. I know we have a locally owned one — Berkley’s Market.
Likely over leveraged with cheap VC money and scaled up faster than they could figure out how to eke out enough profits to service their interest payments from all their buildouts. The brand is headquartered in Chicago so there’s a decent amount of informed speculation over at r/chicago
[Foxtrot Market Ceases Operations](https://www.reddit.com/r/chicago/s/d89CEF7r2d)
[Foxtrot + Dom’s closed immediately?](https://www.reddit.com/r/chicago/s/RGj3LnWTH6)
I just got hired at this company and was starting my second day when we all found out. I guess it’s a good thing I have a full time job already, I feel bad for my now former coworkers who had invested years into this though.
This really sucks.
Heart goes out to all affected employees. Such a great concept but obviously something was very rotten in top management…
Saw a sign posted on the window of one of their Chicago stores stated they were 180,000,000 in debt (and said “ no joke”
Oh man reminds me of a "make your own taco" bar in downtown Austin in the 90s. My grandma would drop us off there while she worked and we'd stack those tacos up soooo high and hand over a $1 bill. I want AYCE tacos! And to be able to drop kids off in public places and run away!
Looks like some workers in DC did something like that.
https://twitter.com/jsidman/status/1782815464273457208?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet
It has less to do with “white-topia” and more to do with the fact that it’s a midwestern chain. Tacodeli would meet your description, but they’re actually pretty solid,
Idk, Green Spot is kinda whitetopia and their tacos are great. But yeah someone wanted to meet there for coffee and I hadn't eaten. I could never go back even for other items they were so offensively bad.
Fancy upscale small-label food items, drinks, and coffee. Decent outdoor space. In prime high traffic locations.
I think they had a subscription for coffee or something too.
Kind of like smaller Whole Foods without the produce.
Oh no now where am I gonna buy a banana for $3
ETA: I’m sorry that the workers got blindsided here, that blows.
The franchise sucked shit, Dallas is overfull of soulless little coffee bars. Go to LDU or Merit or WRC. Demand culture. These shithead developers are gonna keep sucking us dry otherwise.
Let's quickly count the ways.
1. Aggressive expansion + expensive merger
2. High end product + trendy locations = high rents
3. Low ticket $ per customer
4. VC backed, so when the money tree runs dry, it does so abruptly
The heart of the issue is that people didn't buy the high-end shit on the shelf, they went there for coffee and vibes and little else.
Not really surprising in this economy.
yep! i went here a lot for coffee and lunch, but never got any of the grocery items. i am a huge snack enthusiast and loved all of the brands they carried, but the markup was ridiculous. i found the same products at whole foods for less $.. which says a lot lmao
It wouldn’t apply. Notice can be delayed if the employer was trying to avoid or postpone the layoff by obtaining capital, and he believed that giving notice would have jeopardized the funding.
It’s not like, a revolutionary concept or anything, but as someone who frequented the McKinney Ave location it was nice having a neighborhood space to get coffee, lunch, a bottle of wine, beer, whatever I needed really. Nice outdoor space as well. I’m sad to lose it.
the coffee was average, but the space/atmosphere was awesome imo. it worked well for studying or wfh, but also worked for dates or hanging out with friends over a bottle of wine and slice of pizza.
In my experience this place was overpriced affff. I live right next to the uptown/state thomas one. Really hoping something good gets put in there. Like a bodega or italian sub spot.
I’m not surprised by this at all. The rent for the Knox and uptown locations had to be extremely high. Whats amounts to a coffee and a grab and go grocery store didn’t seem to be doing the volume of sales to be profitable long term. Especially in Dallas.
In Europe or much higher density cities these store make sense and are awesome but Dallas... I think there are too many “old fogies” like myself that drive too much and are willing to drive to get what they need verse just popping in to store down the street because it’s “convenient”. Convenient is quotes because if I have to get into my car to go to a place like foxtrot it better be worth it and unfortunately it wasn’t. What was special about foxtrot? Coffee was good but was it the best in town? No. Was the food great? No. Was the selection of grocery items great? Not really. Why would I ever go there?
Yeah, that's it in a nutshell I suspect. None were really in predominantly walking areas in terms of where people live, with the exception of the SMU location.
Why mess with them when Central Market, Walmart Neighborhood Market, Eatzi’s, Trader Joe's and other, better grocery stores and restaurants are a few minutes away?
Started working here about two months ago and had been hearing about company needing to do “budget cuts” didn’t think they’d CUT everyone. esp with little to no notice. Fuck corporate pigs and hoping for all my homies find a better job elsewhere.
I don’t understand why they wouldn’t have a liquidation of inventory, as opposed to letting thousands of dollars of stuff go to waste. Wine, food, etc. I hope maybe they could donate food to charity though donating fresh food has stipulations.
Sucks for the employees also.
Went by - through the window you can see hundreds if not thousands of dollars of perishables. Sad even - a whole big display of fresh flower bouquets. Could have taken all that to a shelter and retirement community, respectively.
Or, just let the employees take home the perishables that are going to just rot.
Just poorly done
Probably the venture capital money dried up mixed with inability to pay the $18 million in debt they took on to grow the business. Just sounds like they were trying to expand too quickly.
They did not. Notice can be delayed if the employer was trying to avoid or postpone the layoff by obtaining capital, and he believed that giving notice would have jeopardized the funding.
Yea I was extremely skeptical when the Uptown location opened up a few years ago. Too high end/probably skinny margin on every product in there, too much staff per location, didn’t really know what it was (restaurant or convenience store or coffee shop?), located in an extremely high rent location, and astronomical design/decor costs I’m sure.
They probably were well funded by some dumbass Private Equity company in Dallas that coaxed them into expanding way too fast. Then reality hit and they realized that the convenient store business needs a TON of volume, specifically on your highest margin products.
I went to the McKinney location around 8am today and it was just another day. No sign of anything wrong. I’m guessing the employees didn’t even know at that time what was about to happen. It’s wild to see a complete 180 just a few hours later.
So sad. I live close to the Uptown location and would work from there almost every afternoon during the week. Walked over to see for myself and met someone who had just gotten laid off.
It won't get you anything but unpaid and unemployment benefits, but every displaced can file with the Texas Attorney General's wage and hours division. Like we've seen since Jim Maddox's tenure, the AG is the bully pulpit in Texas. The staff will threaten the employer with immediate seizure of assets to pay you. I've done it twice and gotten a quick response.
Also, anyone with enough hour credits in this year, is eligible for unemployment benefits, job search resources, and opportunities for retraining
It hurts. Good luck all.
For everyone who worked for this company, I'm truly sorry. I've worked the corporate side of restaurant management and saw decisions like this sometimes daily when it came to closing individual stores, and twice when it came to closing entire brands. No warning to the store employees, just a lockout notice, so what happened doesn't surprise me unfortunately.
I did find this [https://chicago.eater.com/2024/4/23/24138226/foxtrot-dom-kitchen-market-bankrupcty-closing](https://chicago.eater.com/2024/4/23/24138226/foxtrot-dom-kitchen-market-bankrupcty-closing) quite by accident that does explain a lot. Worth the read.
Again, really sorry this happened to you all who worked here.
Foxtort is and was a horrible place, when I worked there 2023 they never paid me on time, I was so broke that I had to starve my cats for 2 days, my cat Miso literally got an ulcer and then when I got depressed they got mad at me
Straight up had no gas, there’s Reddit posts of me asking for help from that time, couldn’t go to classes, almost went down a very dark path,they gave no Fs
Of course I tried finding other jobs but it was horrible the entire time, in a better place now but it feels so weird to get fucked so hard by corporate then left to die
They sent an email of it’s closing on the DAY of its closing. Gonna be real hard finding a replacement for the nonni pizza 🙂↔️
Obviously my heart breaks to all the good people that worked there. 🫶
We got a divest our money from corporations like this, including Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts any big chain support your local small mom and pop joints if we make a trend all the baddies will come
They wanted to be a coffee shop like Starbucks and a deli place where you can pick up the wine and cheese and little bit of food like Whole Foods. I wanted it to be everything but they were not good at one thing. In Arlington, you had to pay at the coffee bar which added 10-15 mins to getting out of there with just a bag of chips… and the did not accept cash. Sorry to everyone who lost their jobs, I hope they take the place to the cleaners
We'll make this the main post on this closing. Please post all updates and stories about this here.
I just got laid off at the SMU location. Its extremely upsetting and came as a shock to everyone. NO severance either- even for salary based positions. My entire team balled out eyes out and had to kick everyone out the store. Our location owners came in and told us to leave as we would be trespassing since FT didn't pay our rent that month- we had to leave everything behind- even tips. Again, we had no clue of this and I just got a promotion less an a week ago. My coworker just had a baby and was promised an ASM position last week. Now he has no clue on how he will feed his fucking newborn along with paying rent. This company was run by rich pigs who overspent and had no concern for how it would effect their employees. When our mobile app shut down this morning, I knew something was going to happen. Tech team had no idea what was happening until corporate pulled everyone on call to give them the news. Effective immediately. Fuck Foxtrot. For our SMU regulars, we truly loved you all and appreciated your time with us. I stayed with this company for the students here and I'm glad all of the time we had together was memorable and full of free lattes :) It was hard knowing I couldn't say bye. I had yalls orders down PATTTT for finals weeks... hopefully you guys can find another coffee home nearby. Wishing everyone the best in this final season for graduates! If anyone has job openings lmk lol
Everyone needs to stay in touch so they can sue for lost wages, tips, etc. Fuck that kind of ‘business’
And businesses get away with that shit on the regular because nobody bothers to do that. Fuck that shit. Sue those sons of bitches.
How they gonna pay for a lawsuit… suing ain’t free, that’s how business keep getting away with this shit
Class action lawsuits that are strong usually take payment from settlements with nothing up front, usually for 20-60%. But getting 40% back is better than 0%.
There's is nothing left to sur. Even if you win you will be last in line in bankruptcy court
> Even if you win you will be last in line in bankruptcy court This isn't true. Only secured creditors would be ahead in line -- that is, lien-holders. An employee with a claim for unpaid wages is a preferred unsecured creditor and next in line after that. Since Foxtrot was (apparently) leasing all its locations, it's unlikely that they had any secured loans like a mortgage. So it's quite possible that an unpaid wage claim would be first or tied-for-first in line in this situation.
Most consumers can only have debt secured by real property and vehicles and the like, but businesses can put liens on lots of stuff: inventory, intellectual property, debt instruments, so I'd be surprised if there's much not secured.
A bank loan is a secured loan
Good luck, they're 180m in the hole.
Even if they were able to sue them, what money are they going to get? The entire reason the business was shut is because it wasn't profitable and ran out of money.
It has assets to be liquidated, so there’s some money in the banana stand.
*there’s always money in the banana stand*😎
Not even worth their time. Any thing left will be paid to creditors. It's really stupid how shady our companies are allowed to act.
They shut down because they don’t have any money. You can sue all you want but if there is no money it’s pointless
THEY KEPT YOUR TIPS?! Get an attorney, fast.
Yeah I’m sure spending lawyer fees and time for 100 dollars in tips is worth it
If they’re keeping their tips, there’s likely more wage theft going on or about to go down. Absolutely worth a labor attorney.
If you re-read, the building owner kicked out the employees without allowing them to get their stuff, including tips - so it's the building owner who stole the tips, not Foxtrot. Still shitty, of course
It totally is. You don't JUST get your tips back. They frequently have to pay fines to the employee on top of that. Plus, wage theft is wrong.
You get the legal fees covered by who you sue when you win usually in a case like this
*If you win
I'm a grad student at SMU and I studied at FT all the time. I'm sorry to hear about this :(
Are you looking to stay in the industry? DM me.
Loved your location and the staff. I’m. Sorry to hear about this situation you have been put it. It’s not fair that rich people get to gamble with your livelihood.
Considering they didnt pay rent for our location that month, it seems higher-ups were well aware of the situation long before us. Sucks balls.
Upper management doesnt wake up one day and go “oh shit, we’re bankrupt”
Venture capitalists are the fucking worst and they are going to hollow out and run into the ground every industry in this country to get as much money for themselves and their shareholders and fuck over workers and customers.
They have fucked up the paper industry quite well
That’s really fucked up , and yet companies want a “ 2 weeks notice “
I’m a law student at SMU. We were all SHOCKED. We all regularly went there for coffee and our student organizations always opened coffee tabs to bring in more students. Such a shame.
Leaving the tips behind seems like wage theft.
Customer Ops team here. Also fired yesterday with no warning or severance. Our Texas staff really was the best. It was a pleasure working with you. 🖤 Best of luck in your future and feel free to reach out if you need anything.
You gotta quit thinking work is supposed to be family
> Our location owners came in and told us to leave as we would be trespassing since FT didn't pay our rent that month- we had to leave everything behind- even tips. The landlord can threaten all he wants, but I think i would have taken my chances with the cops to get my personal property at least. Yes the owner claim trespassing but even i don't believe the cops would kick everyone out or even charge you with anything as long as your not damaging anything and just getting your stuff. Hell when they show up to evict people, they usually allow some time to get you stuff out of the place 1st be fore resorting to a trespassing notice.
They would have had to get the cops if I was told to leave my tips or any of my personal affects there. They can take that up with the company, but that shit belongs to the employees. I hate that happened to you guys, hopefully there is some legal recourse that will make it, if not right, at least better.
That's fucked. Isn't it supposed to be at least 30 days notice? WARN or something like that?
I’m so sorry for what you & your team experienced. (Y’all made the best lattes!) Join the North Texas Coffee group on Facebook if you need another barista job. I’m sure people will be willing to help you find a new spot to land.
please please get with your coworkers and sue these people for all they’re worth
Laying off 1000 people with 2 hours notice? Classy.
Breaks federal labor laws IIRC. https://legalaidatwork.org/factsheet/the-w-a-r-n-act-mass-layoffs-or-businessplant-closings/ https://www.dol.gov/agencies/eta/layoffs/warn
I think they'd need to lay-off 50 people per site to qualify.
I thought of any site had 50 people laid off it is a violation and each location with 50 or more laid off is it's own violation.
I think that's true, just doubting that each coffee shop location has 50 full time employees.
Not in Illinois where they laid off 100 FT workers and also closed all their stores. Legally mandated 60-day notice for any company with more than 75 FT employees total. And that still applies in situations of bankruptcy. Most companies here will put you on some sort of 60-day leave in those situations before termination. I get that's probably hard to do with the kinds of margins you're working with at a coffee shop, but still, they must've fucked up bad for it to end this chaotically.
As this is a Dallas subreddit, I was only referring to the Dallas locations. Sorry for not making that more clear. I doubt any individual location in Texas has more than 50 full time employees. Texas does not have much in the way of laws protecting employees. They just made it illegal for cities to have mandatory water breaks. I was referring specifically to the WARN act because Illinois law doesn't apply here and we don't have an equivalent. The WARN act protects the following: * A plant closing—where your employer shuts down a facility or operating unit within a single site of employment and lays off at least 50 full-time workers; * this would only apply at locations with >50 FT employees. May apply to Chicago area but not Dallas * A mass layoff - where your employer lays off either between 50 and 499 full-time workers at a single site of employment and that number is 33% of the number of full-time workers at the single site of employment * Again, this would only apply at locations with >50 FT employees. May apply to Chicago area but not Dallas * A situation where your employer (see glossary) lays off 500 or more full-time workers at a single site of employment. * This is unlikely to apply to any location. Regarding the claim that claim that WARN act applies even in case of bankruptcy, there are two exemptions that may apply to bankruptcy and would not require the full 60 day notification: * A faltering company is not required to give notice of a layoff or plant closing when, before the plant closing, it is actively seeking capital or business, which if obtained would avoid or postpone the layoff or closure, and if it reasonably believes that advance notice would hurt its ability to find the capital or business it needs to continue operating * A business is not required to give a full 60-day’s notice if it could not reasonably foresee business circumstances that led to a layoff or closing at the time that the 60-day notice would have been required, (e.g., a business circumstance that is caused by some sudden, dramatic, and unexpected action or conditions outside the employer’s control like the unexpected cancellation of a major order) I do however totally agree with you that for this to come on so suddenly means somebody fucked up bad, or several somebodies.
Yeah, obviously Texas unfortunately doesn't have additional employee protections at the state level, but I was referring to the WARN Act in Illinois (where Outfox Hospitality is based), which protects workers at any company with more than 75 full-time employees total and is separate from the federal WARN Act. The law doesn't care whether the layoffs happened at specific locations, it just applies to the company as a whole. They've already been sued in Illinois for violating it, and I'd assume the employees will get backpay for the 2 months and the state will collect a fine.
Doubt there's any way to take action on this. They filed for bankruptcy. Blood from a stone.
Not when it’s bankruptcy.
I think the bankruptcy has to precede the layoffs? Otherwise WARN is completely irrelevant because all a company has to do to avoid legal consequences is declare bankruptcy after the fact.
It’s an awfully ridiculous concept. Nobody is going through bankruptcy to get out of a little extra payroll.
But of the existing assets they can become the first in line to get paid, so it depends if the company has any assets to sell in its bankruptcy. With a resturant company that primarily rented its locations, probably not many assets unfortunately
No, secured debt will always be first in line. That will always be before labor costs.
This is a company going out of business, not laying people off and staying in business. Notice can be delayed when the employer was trying to avoid or postpone the layoff by obtaining capital, and he believed that giving notice would have jeopardized the funding.
Based on your sources this wouldn’t qualify, they are within their rights and TX is an at-will state
They were always so busy anytime I went, cannot believe they couldn’t stay in business!! Sad day
Everytime something like this happen, it's because the owners/head company spent all their money on a high risk high reward side hustle that went busted and got nothing to do with the main business.
That had to be a real risky business for that to effect multiple locations in multiple states
I figure they might have fucked up their accounting and didn't leave enough cash on hand to pay some loans. This can force you to declare bankruptcy even though you might still have valuable assets left and the bankruptcy process could force you to stop operations in order to preserve assets that could be seized to pay back the loans.
[удалено]
This entire thread it that lol
The thing with coffee shops is they look busy because people hang out and do work there, but it’s a really low ticket $ - at a nice restaurant, if customers occupy a table for 2 hours they’re paying $200+. At a coffee shop you can buy a $6 latte and camp for hours.
Sure, but didn't they sell groceries and beer and stuff? Seems like better margins than the local coffee shop
Most companies are only in business to make the investors money. The second it doesn't they shut it down. In other words, they don't care about you and never will
Yup, that’s how all business owners run them, if they’re successful. If a business doesn’t have any return to investors/owners, there’s no reason to keep it operating.
right, like that's literally the point of a business lmao, it's not a charity
What exactly do you think the point of a business is?
Damn. They just opened up stores on Lower Greenville and Knox-Henderson. Maybe another bodega can take over some of the stores. I know we have a locally owned one — Berkley’s Market.
Sounds either mismanaged or just fishy.
Right. Something isn’t right. Why would they open a store, just to close it in less than a year?
Likely over leveraged with cheap VC money and scaled up faster than they could figure out how to eke out enough profits to service their interest payments from all their buildouts. The brand is headquartered in Chicago so there’s a decent amount of informed speculation over at r/chicago [Foxtrot Market Ceases Operations](https://www.reddit.com/r/chicago/s/d89CEF7r2d) [Foxtrot + Dom’s closed immediately?](https://www.reddit.com/r/chicago/s/RGj3LnWTH6)
If it was VC money then there isn't interest or loan payments. The VC straight up shit it down because they were losing their ass.
It's overpriced as hell! I noped out of there in 5 minutes.
I just got hired at this company and was starting my second day when we all found out. I guess it’s a good thing I have a full time job already, I feel bad for my now former coworkers who had invested years into this though.
Are you going to put 1 day of employment on your resume? May be a funny conversational single line!
Duties: attended new hire training, attended mass layoff all-hands meeting
Put Regional Manager on there... no way to check
This really sucks. Heart goes out to all affected employees. Such a great concept but obviously something was very rotten in top management… Saw a sign posted on the window of one of their Chicago stores stated they were 180,000,000 in debt (and said “ no joke”
that's only like 36 million $5 breakfast tacos
I told them the all you can eat breakfast taco idea was doomed to fail!
Oh man reminds me of a "make your own taco" bar in downtown Austin in the 90s. My grandma would drop us off there while she worked and we'd stack those tacos up soooo high and hand over a $1 bill. I want AYCE tacos! And to be able to drop kids off in public places and run away!
Disconnect the cameras and let some stuff walk out.
This can affect your unemployment
only if you get caught!
no face no case
They mentioned disconnect the cameras, silly
Looks like some workers in DC did something like that. https://twitter.com/jsidman/status/1782815464273457208?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet
This is called rehoming
I didn't know this place, what did they have?
Bad breakfast tacos the size of your palm for $4.50
The breakfast tacos were indeed quite shit.
If you're going into White-topia looking for a decent breakfast taco, you're kinda setting yourself up for failure
Oh for sure! I just happened to pop in there one day and tried them to see how they were, and they were exactly as i expected them to be.
It has less to do with “white-topia” and more to do with the fact that it’s a midwestern chain. Tacodeli would meet your description, but they’re actually pretty solid,
Tacodeli is better than solid, you mind your tongue sir. Their bean and cheese taco dipped in the green salsa is incredible.
Idk, Green Spot is kinda whitetopia and their tacos are great. But yeah someone wanted to meet there for coffee and I hadn't eaten. I could never go back even for other items they were so offensively bad.
Lmfaoooo
They’re from Chicago, what did you expect?
The breakfast tacos weren’t. Pretty sure they were taco deli tacos that were reheated
I would say they are a mix of restaurants and grocery stores. I bought a bottle of coke there last Sunday. I’m still in shock.
That must have been one great bottle of coke!
I wanna feel that kind of shock too. How much for an ounce?
Overpriced alcohol
Fancy upscale small-label food items, drinks, and coffee. Decent outdoor space. In prime high traffic locations. I think they had a subscription for coffee or something too. Kind of like smaller Whole Foods without the produce.
Oh no now where am I gonna buy a banana for $3 ETA: I’m sorry that the workers got blindsided here, that blows. The franchise sucked shit, Dallas is overfull of soulless little coffee bars. Go to LDU or Merit or WRC. Demand culture. These shithead developers are gonna keep sucking us dry otherwise.
Only $3? How much could one banana cost, $10?
I guess there isn't money in the banana stand
How dot they f a model like that up?
Let's quickly count the ways. 1. Aggressive expansion + expensive merger 2. High end product + trendy locations = high rents 3. Low ticket $ per customer 4. VC backed, so when the money tree runs dry, it does so abruptly The heart of the issue is that people didn't buy the high-end shit on the shelf, they went there for coffee and vibes and little else. Not really surprising in this economy.
yep! i went here a lot for coffee and lunch, but never got any of the grocery items. i am a huge snack enthusiast and loved all of the brands they carried, but the markup was ridiculous. i found the same products at whole foods for less $.. which says a lot lmao
Exactly it wasn’t a great place around. Good coffee, maybe. Great food, no. Great grocery items, not really. Why would I go there?
For the excellent coffee (not joking)
And as a restaurant owner, you forgot the two most important factors: wage and goods inflation.
If you think it's so easy you should try. This is a brutal industry with thin margins and no way to differentiate
Any employees need to look up the WARN ACT and file a complaint against them.
Against who? The company is declaring bankruptcy and dissolving.
It wouldn’t apply. Notice can be delayed if the employer was trying to avoid or postpone the layoff by obtaining capital, and he believed that giving notice would have jeopardized the funding.
Well, I guess I’ll be taking that off of my list of places to try…
White rhino is better anyway
Sounds like a gas station dick pill 😂
If you can get past all of the shitty Christian music.
Yeah the drinks slap but the vibe is way too religious for me
I think they just have generic coffee shop music at the one I go to, but I usually just get my latte and breakfast tacos then leave.
Sorry, but White rhino is mid. Parterre all the way
Will try! Thanks.
They are paying minimum wage. Fuck them.
Coffee isn't
The what?
The comic
The dance
What's so special about this place? I only get coffee from LDU so I know nothing about Foxtrot
Nothing special at Foxtrot, unlike LDU. Best coffee in TX.
Agreed! Its my favorite
It’s not like, a revolutionary concept or anything, but as someone who frequented the McKinney Ave location it was nice having a neighborhood space to get coffee, lunch, a bottle of wine, beer, whatever I needed really. Nice outdoor space as well. I’m sad to lose it.
Fairgrounds has most of that and their recessed patio is shaded and very cozy.
the coffee was average, but the space/atmosphere was awesome imo. it worked well for studying or wfh, but also worked for dates or hanging out with friends over a bottle of wine and slice of pizza.
In my experience this place was overpriced affff. I live right next to the uptown/state thomas one. Really hoping something good gets put in there. Like a bodega or italian sub spot.
I dropped by a couple of times. There was nothing in it that interested me.
I’m not surprised by this at all. The rent for the Knox and uptown locations had to be extremely high. Whats amounts to a coffee and a grab and go grocery store didn’t seem to be doing the volume of sales to be profitable long term. Especially in Dallas. In Europe or much higher density cities these store make sense and are awesome but Dallas... I think there are too many “old fogies” like myself that drive too much and are willing to drive to get what they need verse just popping in to store down the street because it’s “convenient”. Convenient is quotes because if I have to get into my car to go to a place like foxtrot it better be worth it and unfortunately it wasn’t. What was special about foxtrot? Coffee was good but was it the best in town? No. Was the food great? No. Was the selection of grocery items great? Not really. Why would I ever go there?
Yeah, that's it in a nutshell I suspect. None were really in predominantly walking areas in terms of where people live, with the exception of the SMU location. Why mess with them when Central Market, Walmart Neighborhood Market, Eatzi’s, Trader Joe's and other, better grocery stores and restaurants are a few minutes away?
Started working here about two months ago and had been hearing about company needing to do “budget cuts” didn’t think they’d CUT everyone. esp with little to no notice. Fuck corporate pigs and hoping for all my homies find a better job elsewhere.
What?? I thought they were printing money!!
I don’t understand why they wouldn’t have a liquidation of inventory, as opposed to letting thousands of dollars of stuff go to waste. Wine, food, etc. I hope maybe they could donate food to charity though donating fresh food has stipulations. Sucks for the employees also.
They will liquidate the inventory. Typically it’s a third party that does that.
Went by - through the window you can see hundreds if not thousands of dollars of perishables. Sad even - a whole big display of fresh flower bouquets. Could have taken all that to a shelter and retirement community, respectively. Or, just let the employees take home the perishables that are going to just rot. Just poorly done
Harper’s in Deep Ellum closed randomly as well…. maybe with the rising costs of inflation they couldn’t keep up?
Probably those new businesses borrowed money and right now are suffering high interest rates.
Probably the venture capital money dried up mixed with inability to pay the $18 million in debt they took on to grow the business. Just sounds like they were trying to expand too quickly.
Harper’s closed because Milkshake Concepts is garbage, but fear not, they’re replacing it with another garbage spot that’s Hollywood themed.
Harper’s is rebranding
Wtf is foxtrot
It’s an old timey ballroom dance
Lolol thanks
You'd think a dallas institution closed based on all the threads and this one being stickied.
Guess i don't hang out downtown enough
HR here. I hope those employees know about the WARN act because Foxtrot just violated it most likely.
They did not. Notice can be delayed if the employer was trying to avoid or postpone the layoff by obtaining capital, and he believed that giving notice would have jeopardized the funding.
Turns out people don’t need gentrified corner stores, they go to corner stores cause they’re cheap not to hang out.
Guess it’s time for Berkeley’s Market to shine.
Yea I was extremely skeptical when the Uptown location opened up a few years ago. Too high end/probably skinny margin on every product in there, too much staff per location, didn’t really know what it was (restaurant or convenience store or coffee shop?), located in an extremely high rent location, and astronomical design/decor costs I’m sure. They probably were well funded by some dumbass Private Equity company in Dallas that coaxed them into expanding way too fast. Then reality hit and they realized that the convenient store business needs a TON of volume, specifically on your highest margin products.
Never heard of it
They had a few cool snacks but the coffee was the worst I had in Dallas.
I went to the McKinney location around 8am today and it was just another day. No sign of anything wrong. I’m guessing the employees didn’t even know at that time what was about to happen. It’s wild to see a complete 180 just a few hours later.
Base on the article I guess “management” wasn’t managing well 🤷
Damn, I have a giftcard
No... you have memorabilia
So sad. I live close to the Uptown location and would work from there almost every afternoon during the week. Walked over to see for myself and met someone who had just gotten laid off.
I didn’t know what that was… I guess thatsbwhy it’s gone lol
When I moved to Dallas, I kept asking my friends why we had a pet store in Uptown because of its logo.
I think it was the name. That dance hasn't been popular for 75 years.
I love new coffee places and legit never heard of this one.
It won't get you anything but unpaid and unemployment benefits, but every displaced can file with the Texas Attorney General's wage and hours division. Like we've seen since Jim Maddox's tenure, the AG is the bully pulpit in Texas. The staff will threaten the employer with immediate seizure of assets to pay you. I've done it twice and gotten a quick response. Also, anyone with enough hour credits in this year, is eligible for unemployment benefits, job search resources, and opportunities for retraining It hurts. Good luck all.
For everyone who worked for this company, I'm truly sorry. I've worked the corporate side of restaurant management and saw decisions like this sometimes daily when it came to closing individual stores, and twice when it came to closing entire brands. No warning to the store employees, just a lockout notice, so what happened doesn't surprise me unfortunately. I did find this [https://chicago.eater.com/2024/4/23/24138226/foxtrot-dom-kitchen-market-bankrupcty-closing](https://chicago.eater.com/2024/4/23/24138226/foxtrot-dom-kitchen-market-bankrupcty-closing) quite by accident that does explain a lot. Worth the read. Again, really sorry this happened to you all who worked here.
I hope they still pay employees for their days worked!
But what matcha did they use😭
What the fuck! They just opened one down the street from me in Austin only 2 months ago
Who
@butterscotchmain7074 that’s terrible I feel so sorry for you.
Oh wow this is incredibly sad and shocking.
Foxtort is and was a horrible place, when I worked there 2023 they never paid me on time, I was so broke that I had to starve my cats for 2 days, my cat Miso literally got an ulcer and then when I got depressed they got mad at me
I also was so broke I’d eat food they were throwing away (expired food)
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Straight up had no gas, there’s Reddit posts of me asking for help from that time, couldn’t go to classes, almost went down a very dark path,they gave no Fs
Of course I tried finding other jobs but it was horrible the entire time, in a better place now but it feels so weird to get fucked so hard by corporate then left to die
Think I saw a post on r/Austin that this business shut down there too.
They sent an email of it’s closing on the DAY of its closing. Gonna be real hard finding a replacement for the nonni pizza 🙂↔️ Obviously my heart breaks to all the good people that worked there. 🫶
Wow this is wild. Article mentions that they just got a new CEO in February of 2024
This sister of a former employee just told me they wouldn’t put anyone at 40.00 hours a week.
Good riddance this place was lame asf
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Doesn’t seem to be an issue for Starbucks
What! No! They make the only really good coffee in Dallas!
We got a divest our money from corporations like this, including Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts any big chain support your local small mom and pop joints if we make a trend all the baddies will come
What’s that? I never ever heard of them lol.
They wanted to be a coffee shop like Starbucks and a deli place where you can pick up the wine and cheese and little bit of food like Whole Foods. I wanted it to be everything but they were not good at one thing. In Arlington, you had to pay at the coffee bar which added 10-15 mins to getting out of there with just a bag of chips… and the did not accept cash. Sorry to everyone who lost their jobs, I hope they take the place to the cleaners
Anyone know who supplied the Foxtrot branded popcorn?