Riverfront BBQ closing its doors

ALBANY — After nearly seven years serving hungry citizens in downtown Albany, Riverfront BBQ is closing its doors Thursday afternoon.

Riverfront BBQ owner Dale Saunders said that the time had come for the restaurant to combine its downtown Albany and Leesburg locations into one.

“It was just a business decision we had to make,” Saunders said. “It made sense for us, for business reasons, to combine our Albany and Lee County operations into one to cut down on overhead and expenses. We’ve got a great location in Lee County with plenty of room and a thriving night business, so it made sense. We’ll still have our Lee County and our mobile unit out by the mall.”

Saunders said the decision to combine the operation into the Lee County space was driven primarily by the fact that the Lee County restaurant did a lot of business at night, as opposed to the Albany location which primarily catered to lunch customers.

“Downtown’s been great us,” Saunders said. “It’s where we got our start. It’s going to be something I’ll miss. I want to support downtown any way I can, (but) this was the decision I needed to make.”

Despite Riverfront BBQ closing doors, the Broad Avenue location, which is owned by Albany businessman Bob Brooks, will soon be home to a new restaurant as entrepreneur and Albany State University Marketing and Communications Director Demetrius Love has purchased Saunders’s equipment and will be opening Riverfront Entertainment District this summer.

According to Love, he plans to open the new restaurant, which will have a Dave and Buster’s style gaming concept later this summer, but will possibly start opening for lunch by the end of June.

For Love, the opportunity to move into the downtown space will not only provide a good business opportunity for him, but for the downtown community as a whole.

“I want to bring to downtown a business concept that would provide the foot traffic and exposure we need to attract more businesses to downtown,” Love said. “I truly believe this is a step in the right direction and I am excited and ready to serve.”