Sea Dog Was Closed to 'Re-evaluate,' May Open Under New Name

Last month, many were shocked to hear that Sea Dog Steak & Ale had closed its doors. Less than two years old, the pub had struggled due to the often "unforgiving" world of restaurants, and an inability to overcome a bad reputation.

Sea Dog may just reopen under a new name, with a new brand and approach. 

Mike Minichello, operations manager at Sea Dog Steak & Ale, asked the Board of Selectmen to approve a "non-use" of its current liquor license. It was approved, giving Sea Dog until June 30, 1013, to update the board on its intentions. If not used by March of the following year, there will be a status update.

"We were losing a good amountof money every month," said Minichello. "We decided to close down. We have a couple of proposals to rebrand. But it'll cost us to rebrand. Instead of losing money, we decided to close, and we are asking for an extension so we can re-evaluate our business plan."

When asked by selectmen what Minichello thinks contributed to the closing, he pointed to a lack of consistency, and an inablity to bring the customers back in even when improvements had been made.

"Well, the town didn't come in as often as we wanted them to," said Minichello, with a smile. "In the restaurant business, you're all about consistency. I've been with the company for a short amount of time, and over the past five months we evaluated it. It was very inconsistent the first eight months, from prices to quality. That is hard to recover from in this industry. Instead of an extra $3, people have an extra $1, and they are extremely judgmental about where to spend that extra $1, and they give you one opportunity to earn it. If you don't, you lose it."

Over the past five months, Minichello said a new team has done a phenomenal job in improving the restaurant. Recently, a show for the Food Network was even filmed there (it hasn't aired yet).

"We need an extension on our license to evaluate and move forward, and it'll take us a couple of months," he said. "Ultimately, we'd love to have a successful business, but we have to evaluate and in order to cut our losses, it was more fiscally responsible to close, and save it, and put it toward moving the business forward."