Ongoing financial struggles for the Boston Market restaurant chain appear to have grown, closing some area locations and having some industry observers wonder about the future of the restaurant chain.
Locally, Boston Market locations in Turnersville and Moorestown are closed. The Deptford location was closed for several weeks recently, but today they are open. Calls to Vineland today go unanswered.
Global business news site Quartz on Wednesday declared “The Boston Market Comeback has Failed” and went on to say that the only remaining Boston Market locations may be just weeks away from closing.
Originally founded as Boston Chicken, in the 1990s they were so popular at the time that one Wall Street analyst called them “The Restaurant Concept of the 90s”. As the need for an expanded menu grew, the restaurant chain rebranded as Boston Market and added other entrees such as meatloaf and turkey.
The Boston Market story has been considerably different the last year or so, as the privately held company navigated through a series of financial challenges which seemed to have lead them recently to closing a significant number of stores.
It’s difficult to get a clear understanding of closed locations as Boston Market is not updating their online location listings to reflect open restaurants.
Restaurant Business Online reported 4 days ago that Boston Market was down to only 27 locations operating, and they began 2023 with around 300! That’s a 90% decrease in open locations!
Locally, for several weeks now the Turnersville location of Boston Market has been closed with realtor “Lease” signage in the windows.
On Wednesday I stopped at the Moorestown NJ location to find it was closed and all of the exterior signage and identifying items were removed from the building exterior.
The Deptford NJ location is open today, but when I visited a few weeks ago they were closed, with reports of it being closed for several weeks.
Vineland location did not answer the phone today. Boston Market does not list Vineland in it’s location map, but it is still indicated as open on Google Maps.
Boston Market Bigger Story To Closed Locations
These closings appear to be an extension of ongoing financial struggles for the restaurant chain which has featured lawsuits from suppliers, employees and others… as well as actions from States.
In February of this year Boston Market lost an $11.9 million lawsuit filed by one of it’s distributors, US Foods, related to unpaid bills. US Foods then filed another lawsuit against Boston Market for an additional $30.7 Million which is still ongoing (Quartz.com)
Just this past week the owner of the Boston Market company Jay Pandya, was denied for the second time a personal bankruptcy filing over technical issues. The judge presiding over that case banned Pandya from attempting bankruptcy for another six months.
Older reports of financial challenges from year include the temporary closing last summer of 27 New Jersey locations due to issues with paying employees. A month later those stores reopened
Lawsuits from other food distributors, and even employees (in Massachusetts) were also part of the 2023 Boston Market financial experience. For a short while last year even the Corporate office was seized.
So the exact fate of Boston Market is not fully clear, but recent financial events and store closings does not paint a happy picture.
That being said the popular Deptford location is open today.
Links and Locations
Boston Market Deptford
891 Hurffville Rd
Deptford, NJ 08096
Boston Market Website