Watertown restaurant Ritcey East struggling to stay open gets help from customers
WATERTOWN - Inside his Watertown restaurant, Max Ritcey can feel the walls closing in.
The 37-year-old is the owner of Ritcey East, a beloved local staple that is up against a mountain of bills.
"Disheartening, I think is the word," said Ritcey. "Restaurants aren't back where they were. Things have changed and if people aren't changing with them, then they are going to go under."
Ritcey opened his restaurant in 2017. Business was great but the pandemic brought things to a halt. He took out loans to help get the restaurant through but now those loans are due and debt is climbing. Ritcey said closing the store is the only option if he does not raise $30,000 by September.
"When I brought up to my staff that this was maybe an option that we would have to close one of my staff members said 'But Max, you fought this hard, are you just going to give up?' And that's what it felt like."
Ritcey started to get the word out. He admitted asking for help is not his strong suit. He made a GoFundMe page to help start raising money for his restaurant and it took off. The account raised roughly $20,000 in three days and brought him 2/3 of the way to his goal.
"There's been a lot of tears. Happy tears but I had some sad tears before. It has been unreal. We've had people lining up at our door at 3 o'clock when we open," said Ritcey. "I've had a lot of bad news lately, but I just want to say that this community is not going to let us close."
