After aggressive rant on Yelp!, owner abruptly closes Colorado restaurant

By Shawn Patrick on February 21, 2024

Online reviews are tough because people seem to only want to leave one when they have a bad experience. As a business owner, I imagine there are times when you want to reply to a bad review and tell the upset costumer how it really is… But even on a bad day, that’s a bad idea! 

The owner of a fancy restaurant in Downtown Denver didn’t get that memo… 

A patron at Avelina was upset because their reservation had been cancelled without any warning or reason given, post this one-star review on Yelp! on Feb. 15, “My reservation I made weeks ago was cancelled without any reason at random and now the restaurant is booked up for the time and we’ve been forced to last minute organize other plans.”

The owner, Kevin Jennings, from Urban Food Group which is based in North Carolina, fired back:

We lost thousands and thousands of dollars trying to stay open after covid. Lodo offices are empty- we can’t even do 1/2 of the sales we were achieving before covid. We paid to keep the place open for the last two years- we are now closed for good- so no- we aren’t booked. We lost our ass and are now done-

All you idiots running this town can do is raise the minimum wage running small business owners out of business. Cry me a river about your dinner reservations.

Soon after, a message was posted on the Avelina website that reads as follows: “At this time we have made the difficult decision to close Avelina. We thank you for your support and patronage during very challenging times for the hospitality industry over the past few years.”