The Barstool Fund - Turkey's Nest Tavern
Up next: Turkey's Nest Tavern (Brooklyn, NY)
Typical of a dive bar, Turkey's Nest is a fun place to be with your group of friends and grab a few drinks. This dive bar specializes in margaritas, and you can enjoy them with thrilling jukebox music.
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I am writing to humbly ask that you include my family’s business as a recipient in The Barstool Fund.
My grandfather bought The Turkey’s Nest Tavern (located at 94 Bedford Ave., Brooklyn, New York), back in 1979. It is a small, local dive-bar in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. My grandfather passed the business down to my father, who in turn recently passed it down to my brother.
Prior to this year, The Turkey’s Nest Tavern had never closed its doors. On March 16, 2020, however, we were forced to close the bar for the first time since my grandfather bought it in the 1980s. We had to close the family business on my father’s birthday. I’ll never forget sitting in the bar together with all the lights off trying to support one another and have a birthday meal for my dad.
From that day forward, things have been hard. We were forced to layoff almost all of our employees in March and April. In April, my grandfather – the man who started the business – fell ill and passed away. We have been doing everything we can to support our staff and keep the business running through this tough time… to keep our family business alive, pay our bills, pay our staff, and keep my grandfather’s legacy going.
When we were forced to layoff most of our staff, my brother began working 10 to 16 hour shifts –he has been putting in 10 to 16 hours a day since April with little to no pay to try to keep the doors open. For our employees who we were forced to layoff, we knew that they needed assistance, even with the unemployment benefits that they were receiving, so we did what we could to provide them with additional funds. We created a GoFundMe Page and did all we could to obtain funds. All of those funds went to our employees. Not a single portion of it went to paying our utility bills or rent, which kept building.
The Turkey’s Nest Tavern is not just a business, it’s a second home and family to not only myself, but to so many others in the community. Many of our employees have lived in the community and worked with us for over 20 years. Several of them have helped raise me, and many have come to our family weddings. The Turkey’s Nest Tavern does what it can to help our community as well. We support a local softball team, and provide a shed in our yard to one of the softball leagues for free so that they can easily access the equipment needed to maintain the fields and operate the league.
We’ve done everything possible to hire our employees back and keep our doors open. However, we were forced to spend a great deal of money conforming the business to the ever changing indoor and outdoor regulations in an attempt to remain open and viable. Now that indoor dining is closed in New York City, we do not think we will be able to keep our doors open and pay our employees through the holidays. For this reason, we are humbly asking for assistance. That money will carry us through another month of payroll, utility bills, and rent. It will allow us to pay our employees – our second family – through this pandemic.
Thank you for your time and consideration. Even if we are not chosen as a fund recipient, please know that we are grateful for everything Barstool is doing for small businesses. Each small business is just a family who put everything they had into making something for themselves and their children. We are grateful for people and companies like you who are willing to help.
Thank you,
Cecilia Ehresman