Il Cappero, the new Italian restaurant in the Lansdowne Town Center, has taken a most unusual road to opening.
After a renovation of the former Not Your Average Joe’s space, Il Cappero opened for business on July 1. A week later they closed temporarily. And as of this afternoon, they were still closed — nearly a month later.
For several weeks now, there has been a sign on the door that reads: “In order to best serve you, and due to being extremely short staffed, Il Cappero will be closed for up to two weeks to further train current staff and hire more staff.”
Two weeks has come and gone. And then some.
The sign was gone today, and we were told they were doing some staff training this evening. But still no official word on when they will reopen.
While rare to open and then close, Il Cappero is not alone in struggling to find the needed staff. The Burn hears this repeatedly from restaurant managers around Ashburn and you will see “help wanted” signs posted at many — if not most — area restaurants.
That is a big problem in this area where so many younger people do not want want or need to work. I grew up in Reston and when I turned 16 looked all over for any kind of job I could find and finally found one at a McDonald’s. It took months to find something. Today in this area so many teens are given everything and don’t need to work. Our lawn mower broke a couple of years ago and while it was being fixed I asked a 16 year old boy in the neighborhood if he would mow our yard for $60 which would have taken him 45 minutes or less and he said he wasn’t interested.
Mark – I think you hit the nail on the head.
It’s definitely bizarre. I had concluded they just never were going to reopen. Thing that puzzles me is why they have no website and why the also took down their FB page and removed themselves from Open Table. Not the usual actions of restaurant planning to open.
It is all very strange, but I have been told they are planning on reopening on or around August 15th. I think they have a new manager too.
I hope they do! Wanted to try it. Time will tell!
Kids here have no interest in working in this area, I own the DQ in Leesburg and we’ve probably had 10 applications in the past 6 Months.
Let’s hope they do re-open soon. “Ash-burg” seriously does not have a true high end Italian if you think about it. Manulu in Frederick (the sister restaurant that all recipes will hail from) in absolutely delicious! Keeping fingers crossed!
It’s open!
It’s an absolute pain to hire solid service industry in this area.
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