‘We Have a Manpower Issue' Top NOLA Restaurant Group Closes 3rd Restaurant in Under a Year

For the third time in under a year, New Orleans restaurateur Robért LeBlanc has announced the closure of one of his group’s popular restaurants, citing a calamitous combination of Hurricane Ida damage, a slower-than-ever slow season, and 18 months of an ongoing pandemic that’s left an entire industry “demoralized.”

LeBlanc owns Cavan’s building at 3607 Magazine Street by himself, which he says made it the “best option” of all the restaurants to close immediately. “We are understaffed and undercapitalized across the board, and if we tried to reopen everything at once, it wouldn’t work. [With] closing Cavan, it’s easier to take the hit myself than to ask others to take a hit,” LeBlanc said. The restaurant will continue to host the private events it was previously booked for over the coming months, he says, and he may reassess its future down the line.

Hurricane Ida exacerbated an already extreme set of challenges regarding staffing, LeBlanc says, because it’s prompted some people to relocate or not come back to town after evacuating. “Sales were already really down because of the delta spike and it being August. Then Ida hit, and it was just this realization for some people,” he says.

“We’ve had one or two people tell us they’re going to other restaurants,” LeBlanc says. “But more tell us they’re leaving New Orleans, leaving the industry. We — New Orleans, really — has a manpower issue.” LeBlanc and Smith’s full statement regarding the closure is below.

NOLA Eater