Sweet Tea Cafe Latest Restaurant to Close in Downtown Smithville

By Kristen Meriwether, Publisher

After two delays due to sidewalk construction, Sweet Tea Cafe opened its doors on Main Street in October 2024 with high hopes and homemade recipes inspired by family traditions. Owner Jessica Walker’s father owned a shop in Smithville for 23 years, and from 18 months old through her formative years, she was in the city.

Walker recalled watching Calvin ride his bicycle down Main Street and remembered former Mayor Mark Bunte, who became a regular at Sweet Tea, running the town at the time.

“We came back [to Smithville] because that was where dad had his business. I [wanted to] be a second-generation business owner in Smithville,” Walker said in an interview this week. “But I remember there being a lot more people back then.”

The restaurant had a great first few months before weathering a difficult January, February and March. There were downtown construction woes and having to navigate rising costs in food that sent eggs from 11 cents to 33 cents apiece.

Things seemed to straighten out for April and May, but then their air conditioner began to fail in June, forcing the restaurant to close for eight days. When they were open, there was water on the floor and it was uncomfortable for customers. They only generated a third of their normal revenue and racked up a $4,000 electric bill, exceeding their rent.

To help offset the losses, they started doing events in Bastrop and the rodeo in Fayette County. The events were profitable, but time away from the restaurant meant Walker had to rely on her staff to cover the kitchen. And they were becoming increasingly unreliable.

On Friday, Aug. 1, Walker said she had two kitchen staff not show up, leaving her to fill in in the kitchen. The next day she had an off-site event and when those same two staff members didn’t show up again, she had no one else to cover the kitchen. They were forced to close the restaurant after the breakfast rush and ultimately decided to close permanently on Monday.

“The biggest hurdle that we had was staffing,” Walker said. “That was ultimately the nail in the coffin for us.”

Walker's experience isn't unique in Smithville, where a wave of closures has left downtown feeling increasingly empty.

Downward Trend 

Sweet Tea is the latest in a string of restaurant closures that have plagued downtown Smithville for the last few years. We asked the City of Smithville for a list of restaurant closures, but City Manager Robert Tamble said that was not data the city kept and referred us to the Chamber of Commerce, which also said it does not keep official records for that data.

A recent post on NextDoor listed the following restaurant closures: Blazers, Fat Cat (open for special events only), Charlies (under new ownership, opening again soon), Honey’s, Sweet Tea, Back Door, Carne Linta, Abbey’s Tavern, Rio Social House, Coach Q’s, Smithville BBQ, Micklethwait BBQ, Red Claw, and Cheesy Sargent.

There doesn’t seem to be a shortage of people willing to try and open a restaurant, but as of the last few years, they don’t seem to last very long. Beyond operational hurdles like staffing, even opening new spots has grown tougher.

Getting a restaurant permitted to open has become a challenge. Even Troy Streuer, who owns Pockets Grille, a Smithville staple for 29 years, isn’t immune to the roadblocks.

Streuer has developed several projects in town, so he wasn’t new to the process. About a year and a half ago he embarked on a kid-friendly patio, bar, food truck project called The Yard, which was featured in February’s State of the City presentation as a current development project.

Streuer said he met with people in the city as he went through the process to make sure everything was in line. But during the third-party review, which uses engineers and architects not employed by or living in the city, they required a drainage study, which costs $18,000.

He and his business partner had already been approved for the business loans and couldn’t add the new cost to the total.

“It got to the point where I don’t know where it’s going to go. What’s going to be next?” Streuer said in an interview this week. “So we just decided we don’t want to sink any more money in this.”

Since they hadn’t closed on the loans yet, Streuer and his partner pulled the plug on the project. He said he was disappointed but held no ill will toward the city.

“I don’t get emotional about things when it comes to developments and real estate, I just don’t let it get to me,” Streuer said. “In the end, maybe it wasn’t meant to be.”

He did, however, offer suggestions to the city to help future restaurant owners navigate the third-party review process, which is making it tougher to get permits in Smithville’s old buildings.

In a conversation with Doug BerryAnn, the city’s building inspector, Streuer suggested providing a checklist to help the mom-and-pop owners know what they need at the beginning of the project and avoid being surprised—like he was—at the end.

“If I would have known this stuff at the beginning, maybe the project would have gone through instead of finding out we need an extra $18,000 plus a detention pond at the end,” Streuer said.

BerryAnn agreed, noting, as Streuer did, that most commercial buildings are done by architects and engineers and developers who know every step, thus avoiding issues.

“We’re just having regular people in town try to take over these old buildings and turn them into restaurants. And that’s great. We want that, but we have to make sure it’s safe and done right,” BerryAnn said in an interview. “Back in the day, you could kind of do anything. And now that the growth is coming…we have to get ready for the growth and get our ordinances right.”

Once he goes full-time in a few weeks, he will begin creating flowcharts for every permit in the city so residents undertaking a project will know what the steps are and who to call at each step of the way.

“I think part of the disconnect is the city expects the citizens to know what to do,” BerryAnn said, noting the reality is most residents don’t. “We expect them to come in and know the ordinance and read it, because it’s on the internet. No one is going to read that. No one’s going to understand it.”

He didn’t have a date for completion of the flowcharts, but given the challenges potential business owners are facing with the third-party review, the project is a priority.

By providing clear steps from initial consultations to third-party reviews, BerryAnn’s flowcharts could be a game-changer for aspiring entrepreneurs in Smithville. If they help prevent surprises like the one that sidelined The Yard, it could ensure more projects make it to opening day.

For Walker, the closure of Sweet Tea marks the end of one chapter but not her entrepreneurial spirit. She buried her father on Nov. 4 of last year and spent every day since working at her restaurant. She said she and her husband will take a short break, but they are already coming up with ideas to use their 37-acre farm in West Point to expand on the from-scratch foods that made Sweet Tea successful.

“It was fun. It had its ups and downs. It had more ups than downs," she said. "But I’m definitely glad I did it."