This Mexican food chain abruptly closed one of its two Wichita restaurants on Wednesday

As of Wednesday, Wichita is down to one Jose Pepper’s restaurant.

The Overland Park-based Mexican food chain abruptly closed its west Wichita restaurant at 2243 N. Tyler Road on Wednesday. A manager who’d been at the restaurant for two years said employees showed up for work on Wednesday morning and were greeted by a giant banner announcing that the restaurant was closed.

The banner reads, “Thank you for your support over the last decade” and encourages people to visit Wichita’s other Jose Pepper’s restaurant at “1423 E. 13th St.” (The address is actually 11423 E. 13th St.)

The west-side Jose Pepper’s was Wichita’s second and opened in February 2012. The east-side restaurant has been open since August 2009.

The manager, who asked not be named, said that employees had no warning about the closing, though they were offered positions at the east-side store. She opted not to take one but posted about her plight on social media and has already received several job offers.

Jody Sight, the director of human resources for Jose Pepper’s, said that the owners decided to close the west Wichita restaurant after much deliberation. Sales had been slumping since COVID, she said, and the company invested money into a remodel last spring hoping that would help.

“It never got sales going in the right direction,” she said. “It was a business decision we had to make and not one we enjoyed making.”

She confirmed that the company offered positions at the east-side Jose Pepper’s to the employees affected by the closure. Several other restaurant owners and managers also reached out on Wednesday offering to help hire displaced staff. They said they heard from representatives from both HomeGrown and On the Border.

The company, which owns 11 Jose Pepper’s restaurants that are in the Kansas City area, in Topeka and in Wichita, also owns two restaurants called Cactus Grill, both of which operate in the Overland Park area.

She said the company would watch the market for another Wichita location where it could potentially open a Jose Peppers or a Cactus Grill restaurant.

“We’re still trying to scope it out and see what we could do,” she said. “Anything’s possible.”