Since opening in Asheville, North Carolina, in 2022, Neng Jr.’s has skilled an upward trajectory that might be the envy of any restaurant. Led by enterprise and life companions Silver and Cherry Iocovozzi, the Filipinx restaurant has garnered many accolades: It was a 2023 James Beard finalist for Finest New Restaurant, considered one of Get pleasure from your meals’s 2023 Finest New Eating places, and in 2024, was named a USA In the present day Restaurant of the 12 months.
This run of fine fortune abruptly got here to a halt on September 27, 2024, when Hurricane Helene hit North Carolina and devastated western Appalachia. The recognition of Neng Jr.’s couldn’t put together its homeowners and workers for the financial devastation and precarity that Hurricane Helene wrought, and months later, with Neng Jr.’s on the cusp of reopening, the Iocovozzis’ story is one which many restaurateurs throughout the state have lived — filled with challenges that extra cooks, with the rising menace of local weather change, can also quickly face.
Neng Jr.’s was shuttered from September 28 to December 11, a interval of over 10 weeks with no single penny coming in. “Even with the success of our restaurant, we don’t have a spine of funding. We actually relied on every week and every day of service to verify we’re not less than breaking even,” Silver Iocovozzi says. There was no massive steadiness of their checking account to verify they may climate just a few weeks of not having the ability to function. Whereas the restaurant itself was not bodily broken by the storm, the crew didn’t have the assets to climate a number of weeks of not being operational. The dearth of energy obliterated hundreds of {dollars} in perishable meals and provides on the restaurant, and the Iocovozzis assess the lack of income from the closure as roughly $80,000.
Neng Jr.’s is simply one of many 250 independently owned eating places within the Asheville space that has endured this financial downturn. The native restaurant trade employs round 22,000 individuals, and tourism contributes roughly $2.9 billion to the native economic system. The hurricane hit in the course of the fall and the winter buying season, significantly busy — and worthwhile — instances of yr for native companies. Customer spending declined by 70 p.c within the fourth quarter of 2024, and in October, unemployment spiked to 9 p.c, up from 2.5 p.c the earlier month. As of January 2025, at an unemployment price of 6.1 p.c, Asheville has the very best unemployment price of any metropolitan space within the state.
Eating places and different small companies face a contradiction: the necessity to reopen, however there’s a structural lack of ability to take action. “We have to assist our economic system, which is actually devastated, and I feel we’re going to need to depend on tourism in an enormous manner. However I don’t assume we’re fairly prepared for it,” Silver says. This monetary precarity has solely been exacerbated by a scarcity of federal and native authorities help. “There’s no lease moratoriums coming down from the state degree. There’s not any help or reduction from these monetary burdens that we have now not simply as enterprise homeowners, however as those who need to pay our payments,” Silver provides. The duo has obtained $750 in FEMA cash, the extent of the help they’ve obtained. “We haven’t heard something again in regards to the grants or loans that we’d apply for.”
Within the face of governmental inaction and lack of communication, the restaurant trade has performed what it does greatest: assist its personal. When the hurricane first hit, the Iocovozzis labored with Ashleigh Shanti of Good Sizzling Fish to supply meals to these in want. In an try to recoup a few of their misplaced income, the Iocovozzis headed to New York to collaborate with fellow cooks to host pop-ups at Brooklyn spots like Leo, Honey’s, and Ops Pizza. “We’re actually grateful for the platform that individuals are giving us in an effort to trudge ahead and proceed on,” Silver explains.
With the return of potable water, the Iocovozzis reopened Neng Jr.’s on December 11, an accomplishment that introduced with it combined feelings. The ethics and optics of reopening can weigh closely on their minds. “I do have issues if it even feels proper to have this superb eating or particular expertise restaurant at this worth level when there’s nonetheless a lot struggling,” Silver wonders. In addition they fear in regards to the emotional labor that could be requested of their workers, most of whom returned when the restaurant reopened. “I feel of us are going to ask in regards to the hurricane so much, particularly in the event that they don’t reside in Asheville, and that’s going to be arduous to reply again and again. It’s very troublesome for us,” Silver explains. No server who has misplaced a liked one must relive that trauma each time they step out into the eating room. Within the face of those issues, the Iocovozzis deal with the truth that eating places could be sources of pleasure for his or her neighborhood, and attempt to deliver that pleasure to patrons. “All of us want a spot of gathering to get pleasure from and to loosen up and to be served and eat good meals and really feel comforted,” Silver says.
The drastic local weather disasters of 2024 point out precarious instances forward for companies alongside America’s japanese coast. Whereas hotter ocean temperatures resulting from local weather change haven’t elevated the variety of storms every year, scientists keep that this has elevated the probability of extreme, devastating storms. “Count on the sudden. Something that we expect may occur may change,” Silver says. Simply because the COVID-19 pandemic revolutionized the restaurant trade, local weather change and pure disasters like hurricanes have the potential to upend whole cities’ food and drinks scenes, which means that cooks just like the Iocovozzis are actually contemplating costs, menu modifications, workers security, and working bills.
The street to restoration for the Asheville restaurant trade continues to be rocky. In accordance with Meghan Rogers, govt director of the Asheville Impartial Restaurant Affiliation (AIR), in 2025, many eating places are nonetheless working on restricted hours and with scaled-back menus. Eating places are reopening within the sometimes slowest time of yr, with out the numerous earnings they might’ve made in the course of the busy fall and vacation seasons. “Our native neighbors have been wonderful at popping out and supporting their favourite eating places, however they’ll’t maintain everybody. We constructed this meals tradition and this degree of eating places as a result of we had such a excessive degree of holiday makers,” Rogers says. Well-liked restaurant Eldr introduced its everlasting closure on January 9, stating on Instagram that “the headwinds from Hurricane Helene and the lengthy delay in reopening was an excessive amount of for the enterprise to bear.” AIR misplaced round 15 of its 150 members resulting from closures.
For the Iocovozzis, reopening has been a decidedly combined bag. “Enterprise is sweet, we could possibly be doing higher, after all. That is the slowest winter I’ve encountered in Asheville in a few years, however most nights we’re absolutely booked,” Silver mentioned in February. “We’re hanging in there the perfect we will. I feel there was a number of hope, however with the lack of Brian Canipelli (chef-owner of native restaurant Cucina 24 and Contrada), I really feel prefer it’s protected to say we’re at a standstill with the entire loss we’ve endured.” Canipelli was a number one determine within the Asheville restaurant trade for many years, and his sudden passing weighs closely on the area people.
The Iocovozzis fear that Asheville can be left behind, as nationwide consideration, understandably, turns towards different crises. “I do know I’m desirous to see individuals come out extra, I’d like to see individuals register what’s occurred right here as magnificent in injury because the fires in Palisades and Altadena. It’s arduous to explain what the area has skilled.” The Iocovozzis are deeply dedicated to the realm, and encourage vacationers to return again. “Make a plan to go to within the spring,” Silver implores. “Actually attempt to uplift these small companies, as a result of Asheville can be a place that’s stuffed with small companies that make the city.”
