Date: Mon, 03 Feb 2014 14:45:56 -0700
From: “Bella Donna Italian Restaurant”
Subject: Pittsboro Matters or does it?
I could write this anonymously, but I guess I am braver than those other anonymous writers or maybe just plain ignorant. This may hurt my business but at this point, I don’t care, it is already suffering, yes, suffering, between the economy and all this Pittsboro Matters group we may not make it.
All we ever heard was there was no place in Pittsboro to eat. Everyone went to Chapel Hill or Cary/Raleigh to find good food. Now we have some good, affordable and even high end restaurants in this area, many who use local, organic, fresh ingredients and there just are not enough people to keep them busy. The shops in Pittsboro should be full all the time. You asked for it, you got it, and look how we are repaid. We have an amazing toy store, beautiful art galleries and clothing stores, book shops, a bakery, day spas, B&B’s, local versions of fast food (Virlies and Al’s Diner) and THERE AREN’T ENOUGH PEOPLE!
Do any of you even understand how much it costs to buy local/organic/fresh? It is not cheap and frankly I am tired of the complainers about the price of REAL, GOOD, FOOD all the while another group says, we won’t come to your restaurant unless it is local, etc. Our take out containers are compostable, 4 times the price of styrafoam,… but we want to give Pittsboro what they want. Our 25# bag of organic pizza flour costs $18 while other restaurants pay $18 for a 50# bag. It also seems like the same people who say they won’t eat unless it is organic/local/compostable are the ones saying we don’t want anyone else to come to Pittsboro. I’m sorry Pittsboro Matters, but you can’t have it all, there has to be some give and take.
Every restaurant has their downfalls, and we certainly have had our share of struggles during this first year of opening BUT we all should be thriving not just surviving. The fast food restaurants aren’t struggling and even if they were, they have the bucks to keep a struggling restaurant alive until the economy changes. If any one of the people who are complaining ever sets foot in a fast-food restaurant or have not shopped downtown when appropriate, whether it be for toys or flowers, you are all truly hypocrites in the most basic sense of the word. Pittsboro is not going to crash and die just because more people are coming. We will all find a way to live together and I pray that no one gets scalped in the process. We need this development to come. We’re ready and not worried about the competition. We’re worried about not enough people. I employ 12 people, some full time, some part time; I don’t want to lay off or cut back hours of any more employees whose families depend on them, some with infant children. We have all been led to believe that Pittsboro was going to be a growing town but it is stalled, dead in the water with no wind and the helping hand to help us move forward is being blocked. We are not all going to die because more people are coming, the grass is going to grow, the trees will continue to grow and the rivers will be protected with the proper oversight.
Word has it that when the by-pass went through the same scare tactics were used by those who enjoy putting fear into the hearts of people. The N&O had a video recently showing the most cramped areas of Cary and
saying that is what we are going to look like. STOP IT! We can do it better, we can have certain restrictions, we can have a say but not moving forward is….nothing. We can do this Pittsboro, but if it takes another 10 years to just get started, what we have now will be gone. Stop the scare tactics. Oh sure, others will take the place of me or any other business when the time is REALLY right but at least let us little guys have a fighting chance. It seems to me that the people who are hollerin’ the most about Chatham Park are not even people who were born and raised here…transplants, just like me. Transplants who like to argue for the sake of arguing. Stop this fight, get Pittsboro growing and moving, I say enough is enough. Let them in or there will be nothing left of the friends we have made who have mortgaged their lives, to live their dream of being small business owners, in the heart of North Carolina.
Donna Bianco, Owner
Bella Donna Italian Restaurant & Pizzeria
440 East Street, Pittsboro, NC 27312
Tel: (919) 545-0900
Email: donna@ BellaDonnaItalianRestaurant.com
www.