A Detroit-style pizza chain is slicing one of its locations for the first time after just one year.
Bay Area favorite Square Pie Guys will close its Palo Alto restaurant on Friday.
“It’s not something that we take lightly and it kind of pisses me off straight up,” founder and owner Marc Schechter said in an Instagram video.
The popular chain is credited for starting the Detroit-style pizza craze in the Bay Area. After opening their first brick-and-mortar location in the SoMa district of San Francisco in 2019, the business has now expanded to 6 storefronts, with their most recent opening in Walnut Creek in December.
The Palo Alto location sits on a segment of the street that is closed to car traffic.
“Ordered PU from you once, accessibility and parking was a challenge with a closed off street. Best to you!” one commenter wrote on the Instagram video.
While orders were stable around lunch over the past year, Schechter told the San Francisco Chronicle that dinner and weekends always seemed slow.
“I’m sorry, and I feel like we let a lot of people down,” Schechter said to his customers on Instagram.
Despite the closure, Schechter said he still has plans to expand his brand. Just yesterday, he and co-author Gabi Moskowitz released “Square Pie Guy,” his debut cookbook.
Schechter also teased that a new location is heating up, but will not be in the South Bay. He told the Chronicle he would be open to returning to Palo Alto someday in the future.