Comedian Kevin Hart shutters vegan fast-food chain in CA on heels of minimum wage hike

California’s fast-food death spiral saw one celebrity’s short-lived chain shutter all of its locations as it appeared “Reality kicked in.”

While George Orwell’s “1984” was routinely called out for being misunderstood as an instruction manual instead of a warning, it looked as though the same could be said for Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged” in California.

Little more than two years after actor and comedian Kevin Hart endeavored to peddle his plant-based preferences to Los Angeles eaters through the launch of his vegan Hart House fast-food restaurant, it was announced that all four locations were closed as of Wednesday.

“Thank you…To our team, guests, and community, who helped make the change we all craved. A Hartfelt goodbye for now as we start a new chapter,” a message on the chain’s Instagram page read.

 

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Speaking with Eater LA, CEO Andy Hooper, formerly president of &pizza, said, “The response to the product has been incredible, and we thank our committed team, our customers, and our community partners for helping make the change we all craved, and for their unwavering support of Hart House.”

In addition to the original location in Westchester that opened in Aug. 2022 a block away from Los Angeles International Airport’s In-N-Out Burger, the chain had expanded to Hollywood, Monrovia and University Park before the sudden closure.

Hart, who had expressed his own mostly plant-based diet in 2020, had told The Hollywood Reporter in Aug. 2022, “I want to give people a plant-based option. If I can give people a place to have the option that’s placed smack dab in the middle of where your McDonald’s, Chick-fil-A, and Burger King [are], people may see a Hart House and say, ‘I’m going to go plant-based today.'”

While neither the official account nor Eater LA cited a specific reason for the closure, the latter did offer, “The restaurant industry continues to face challenges due to the lingering effects of the pandemic, rising operational costs, and a faltering film and television industry.”

“In early September 2024, the ambitious East Coast burger chain Shake Shack shuttered five Los Angeles-area stores, including Culver City, Silver Lake, Koreatown, Downtown, and Canoga Park,” it continued before arguing. “Though Hart House and Shake Shack both diminished their LA presence within a week of each other, the state of California is experiencing a significant boost in fast-food jobs, even as the state’s mandated minimum wage increased from $15.50 to $20 an hour in April 2024.”

However, much like the repeated revisions seen at the federal level with Bidenomics, Employment Policies Institute director of research Rebecca Paxton had told KTLA California’s Gov. Gavin Newsom’s claims about added jobs didn’t tell the whole story.

“So, the governor is saying that the data shows California has the highest fast food employment it’s ever had,” she explained. “Unfortunately, he’s using preliminary data set released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The latest set that the Bureau of Labor Statistics releases is called seasonally adjusted, which is what economists use to measure policy impacts. And if you look at that data set, it shows that since January, fast food jobs in California are down by roughly 3,000.”

Those figures also did not account for the number of employees who may have had their hours cut over the wage hike and subsequently had to seek additional part-time employment to make up the difference.

As Paxton said referring to both the seasonally and non-seasonally adjusted data sets, “One thing that is not included in either of these data sets is a net change. So it’s not measuring the number of folks who have lost their jobs, gained their jobs, or turnover. It’s also not measuring folks that have been like reduced. They’re still employed, but their hours have been reduced.”

Of course, the devastating impact that had led even well-established locations like LA’s only Arby’s to close after 55 years, hadn’t stopped the California Fast Food Workers Union from making their pitch to see the minimum wage raised again to $20.70 “to keep up with the rising cost of living.”

“The union is also demanding more stable schedules, enforcement of backpay owed to employees, and an investigation into what it says are ‘pervasive abuses’ in the fast food industry, such as wage theft, harassment, discrimination, and unsafe conditions,” KTAL had detailed.

While they remained oblivious or invincibly ignorant to the impact minimum wage demands were having on the economy, social media users were not surprised by the fate of Hart’s vegan restaurant.

Kevin Haggerty

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