(Image: Little Big Burger)
Capitol Hill has successfully held off a Portland burger, pizza, and hair styling invasion.
Workers cleaning up inside the 12th and Pike location of Little Big Burger said the clean-out underway was permanent — the burger joint has closed for good.
A check of business licensing and construction permits revealed no clues as to what might come next for the space.
The Portland-born chain debuted on Capitol Hill in April 2019 just as another PDX import was spinning through its final months of quiet business. Sizzle Pie would close its Seattle expansion on E Union later that year.
The burger restaurant’s closure also joins another Portland-related exit from the block. A year ago, CHS reported on the takeover of the Bishop’s chain by Rudy’s giving the Capitol Hill-based chain three locations on its home neighborhood turf.
Meanwhile, Portland-based vegan Jewish deli chain Ben and Esther’s just opened on E Pike.
For Little Big Burger, its closure as one of the first commercial tenants in the Beryl Apartments mixed-use development is part of larger business tides.
Little Big Burger was gobbled up by Chanticleer Holdings in 2015, a North Carolina-based company that owns Hooters and several other restaurant chain concepts. The 12th and Pike closure comes after the holding company announced a new franchise campaign for the chain. “The Little Big Burger brand is time tested and continues to deliver strong financial performance,” the press release reads.
Little Big Burger ended up being out in front with a wave of unionization efforts in the Pacific Northwest — though the push to form the Little Big Union ultimately fizzled.
It’s not clear what programs Chanticleer pursued for its employees over the past two years of COVID recovery. A search of databases for funding efforts like the Paycheck Protection Program is complicated by the multiple smaller companies Chanticleer operates.
Little Big Burger has not responded to CHS’s inquiry about the closure.
The company also closed a Green Lake location at some point during the pandemic and has apparently also been quiet about shutting down a few other previous expansion attempts including an outlet in Austin.
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