June 17, 2024
KTLA-TV5 (CW Los Angeles)
Iconic Hollywood fast food restaurant closes for good
One of the most recognizable neon signs in Hollywood has gone dark forever.
The Arby’s Roast Beef restaurant at 5920 Sunset Blvd. closed on Saturday after 55 years in business.
Customers arrived to find workers covering the windows and doors with plywood and a message reading, “Farewell Hollywood. TY for 55 great years.”
Since it opened on Jan. 5, 1969, the Arby’s had just one owner, Marilyn Leviton, who is now 91 years old.
Leviton told KTLA 5 News -located less than a block from the restaurant- that she had been struggling to stay open for years.
“Truth is, I think it was the pandemic that did us in. I really feel we would have closed during the pandemic [if it weren’t] for the federal loans,” she said.
Other factors, Leviton said, included California’s recent law boosting the minimum wage for fast food workers from $16 to $20 an hour and equipment upgrades required by Arby’s corporate headquarters.
“I’m awfully sorry that it came to this. I think we did a good job for 55 years,” said Leviton.
KTLA reached out to Arby’s for comment but did not receive a response.
Critics of California’s new minimum wage law, including many in the quick-service restaurant industry, have derided it as bad for business and customers. Restaurants have responded by increasing menu prices and, in some cases, laying off employees.
In December 2023, four months before the law took effect, two large Pizza Hut operators eliminated all of their delivery drivers.
Rubio’s Coastal Grill, the San Diego-based Mexican food chain that introduced the fish taco to millions of Americans, recently shuttered 48 California locations, citing the “rising cost of doing business.”