County finds no takers for Cody library cafe

Posted 1/23/18

Commissioners and library leaders moved toward privatizing the Bistro after deciding they could no longer absorb the cafe’s annual losses, which have run between $47,000 and $55,000 in recent years. The hope was that a private business could have …

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County finds no takers for Cody library cafe

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No private businesses appear willing to take over the money-losing cafe inside the Cody library.

Park County commissioners put out a formal request for proposals last month, hoping to find someone to run a cafe in the space that’s now occupied by the county-run Biblio Bistro.

Commissioners and library leaders moved toward privatizing the Bistro after deciding they could no longer absorb the cafe’s annual losses, which have run between $47,000 and $55,000 in recent years. The hope was that a private business could have better luck while paying rent to the county.

Multiple entrepreneurs expressed interest in taking over the cafe, county officials say, but only two people picked up informational packets and only one attended a December walk-through of the Bistro. Then, when the deadline arrived on Jan. 12, “we did not receive any proposals,” Executive Assistant Nicholle Gerharter reported to the commission last week.

Commissioners plan to effectively go back to the drawing board and brainstorm ideas for the future of the Biblio Bistro during a February worksession with the Park County Library Board.

Commissioner Jake Fulkerson suggested the session should cover “what can we do to the place to have it more palatable” and, if those options prove cost-prohibitive, consider what else could be done with the space.

Park County Library System Director Frances Clymer suggested that commissioners consider allowing the Bistro “to experiment with advertising.” Since the Bistro’s opening in 2008, the commission has prohibited it from advertising so as to avoid having the government-run cafe compete with private businesses in Cody.

“That has been the big stumbling block for the Bistro: the fact that we have not been permitted to advertise in any way, really,” Clymer said. “And it’s kind of hard for a business to succeed if they can’t promote themselves.”

She said the Biblio Bistro does have a following that patronizes the cafe daily.

It’s unclear whether commissioners will support the idea of allowing the Bistro to promote itself.

“I’m still back and forth on us becoming in the restaurant business — the county getting in the restaurant business and advertising, etc., etc.,” said Commissioner Lee Livingston.

The Bistro’s losses came to a head last year, when the library board did not have enough money in its budget to purchase new books; due in part to the Bistro’s anticipated losses, the library system is buying this year’s books with money drawn from a reserve account. That prompted Commissioner Joe Tilden to ask library leaders in June, “What’s more important to you, buying new books or keeping the Bistro open?”

In August — following media coverage and criticism of the Bistro’s losses — commissioners and library officials reached a consensus to try privatizing the cafe. The Bistro scaled back its staff and services later that month and is currently offering only baked goods and drinks. Clymer said last week that the change has left “a lot of people very deeply disappointed, because they can’t have a sandwich or some soup when they come to the library.”

The county voted to put out a formal request for proposals on Dec. 5.

On Dec. 13, Cody Enterprise Publisher J.T. Malmberg wrote an editorial predicting that “no one will take over [the] Biblio Bistro.”

“The Biblio Bistro has an unbroken track record for losing money,” Malmberg wrote in part. “What would make someone think they could turn that around?”

He said that, while the cafe has been a nice amenity for patrons, “it’s time to just shut it down.”

Commissioner Tim French brought up the Enterprise’s piece during last week’s discussion about the lack of proposals.

“... The editor of the Cody paper did not do this process any favors by coming out a couple months ago, saying, dissing the whole thing and, ‘why on earth would [you] even apply?’ blah, blah, blah,” French said. “I just want it on the record that he did not do the process any good.”

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