Photograph by Kevin A. Roberts
Joe Sanfilippo in 2011.
Editor's Note: Article has been updated with comments from owner.
Joe Sanfilippo announced this morning that J.F. Sanfilippo's Italian Restaurant will close at the end of December. The final service will be on New Year’s Eve.
"It's not something that we wanted," speaking for family and staff that has remained with him for years. "But it was time to get off the roller coaster. For example, we had a great October—better than last year—then two weeks of absolutely nothing."
In this Q&A, Sanfilippo told SLM that it was an unlikely chance encounter with Charles Drury that led him to open his namesake restaurant inside the Drury Inn & Suites downtown. That was in 1991. Sanfilippo was 24 at the time.
Twenty years later, the chef-owner opened Filippo’s Italian Kitchen & Bar in the Chesterfield Valley. Filippo’s will remain open.
Regarding the downtown location, Sanfilippo said in 2011 that “we made more money when the city looked like Escape from New York than we do now. So many things are different—Southwestern Bell, Edison Brothers, TWA, American Airlines, these were all my customers… Add in the economy, more competition, and fewer workers in general, and it was the perfect storm."
Sanfilippo updated the scenario today: "Then came Ballpark Village," he said. "Then the Rams left town. And the food trucks opening whenever and wherever. And the crime, some of it real, some of it imagined. None of that helped matters much."
The decrease in convention traffic has had an impact as well, especially the "huge, big-spender" conventions. “Our location is very convention-driven," he said in 2011. "Driving more quality convention business would help us immensely, but there's a lot of competition there as well.” Sanfilippo remembers “lines of people forming at 10:45, waiting for us to open for lunch," adding, "That was a while ago.”
Early on, Sanfilippo learned the importance of giving customers what they want, which in his case was a classic Italian menu of pastas, chicken, veal, beef, and seafood. The biggest seller, Rigatoni Giuseppe, made with fresh tomato sauce and spicy cream, takes its name after the chef-owner, “my one indulgence from 20 years ago," as he describes it.
Although bittersweet, Sanfilippo is looking forward to the next four weeks. “For 27 years it’s been me and my family developing wonderful relationships with countless families and friends in the area, and we feel that is something worth celebrating,” he said.
Regarding the future, he 52-year-old restaurateur was cryptic yet hopeful. “Occasionally, businesses decide to go in new directions, and we look forward to what the next chapter holds. for the Sanfilippo family.”
