BY MICHELE MILLER
What’s What New Port Richey
Published October 2020
“We’re moving forward and making something unique is what we’re doing. Once it’s all done, it’s going to be a great place. Unlike anything on the west coast of Florida.”
Brett Ciper
The bars are open again in Florida.
That’s welcome news to local proprietors such as Brett Ciper.
It’s been a long six months of cobbling a patchwork offering to keep things afloat at Ordinance One, a popular downtown brew bar he opened with his wife, Natalie, on March 15, 2018.
Ordinance One is located in a historical building that once housed the city’s fire station, and is part of a Main Street renaissance that’s been hit hard with the COVID-19 restrictions and being last in line in the state’s staggered reopening of the service industry.
It’s a sharp contrast to the dawning of 2020, when live music was a given, patrons were elbow-to-elbow on a good night, with some spilling out to grab a pretzel or lobster roll off the food truck parked out back. Maybe make their way down to other Main Street establishments – like Fitzgerald’s, Cotee River Brewing, Pete’s Grand Central and The Social.
To be sure, the weekends were hopping. Then they weren’t.
Photo Courtesy Ordinance One
Emergency business grants paid rent for a month and payroll for two. Ciper came up with take-out brew specials, sushi-making classes and an open-air artisan market helped plug holes when the place was closed down due to COVID-19 restrictions.
“Five p.m., March 17,” Ciper says in a way that lets you know it’s etched in his mind forever.
The latest stop-gap – a food license. That was procured so Ordinance One could reopen as restaurants around had weeks earlier, and so patrons could order a pretzel sandwich or a slider to-go with that craft beer. Something Ciper had been wanting to do for a while. Just not yet.
He applied for a food license and had it in hand on Friday, Sept. 11, the morning after Governor DeSantis announced that bars would reopen the following Monday.
The news was good, but the timing was frustrating, as are the ambiguous directives from the state, said Ciper.
“I would have held off if I had known this was coming. There would have been less headaches,” he said.
“But if they shut down the bars again. We’ll be fine. We should be fine.”
After hosting a “soft opening,” on Sept. 11, Ciper is treading softly. “I don’t know what to expect. I don’t think anyone knows. I’ve never had to relaunch a business.”
“There’s no course for this,” he said, adding that he feels a sense of responsibility to keep staff and customers safe.
“To keep us open people have to follow the rules,” he said. “So far it seems like people get it. They wear their masks coming in. Stay in their groups.”
Not a lot of customers know about the food, yet, Ciper said. “I guess we’ll have to start marketing that.”
While launched earlier than he expected, food service had always been part of the long-term business plan, said Ciper.
He had already been casually chatting about options with Ted Speck, a customer and downtown resident, who is a business development chef with Welbilt, a restaurant wholesaler located in Trinity.
Speck set him up with a 16 x 23 x 23 Merry Chef speed oven, all-in-one cooking, baking, grilling, and reheating gadget that sits on the top of a counter behind the bar.
“I didn’t want hot dogs. I didn’t want PB & J. I wanted people to be able to have a meal,” Ciper said, noting that the pretzel and sausage plate on the new menu fits the bill. On top of that, the product is sourced from the locally-owned Penguin Pretzel.
There’s no need to hire a chef or build out a full kitchen, meaning Ciper can direct business funds to other things – namely growth.
There are plans for an outside patio to expand occupancy, something Ciper figures he and a helpful crew can put together in a weekend.
He also has plans to build a brewery in an adjacent space.
“We’re moving forward and making something unique is what we’re doing,” he said. “Once it’s all done, it’s going to be a great place. Unlike anything on the west coast of Florida.”
In the meantime, the regulars are trickling back, and there have been some new faces, too.
A newlywed couple from Ohio happened on the place’s re-opening weekend while exploring Florida’s west coast after their honeymoon cruise was canceled.
“They liked the place so much they came back a second time on Sunday,'” Ciper said.
That’s a hopeful sign.
