SmokeShack Barbeque to close Sunday
The owners of the Rostraver Township business said rising meat prices forced the decision.
The owners of SmokeShack Barbeque, a takeout restaurant in Rostraver Township, have announced that they will be closing after this weekend, marking the end of their yearlong tenure next to Val’s Beer Distributor.
Owner Dave Yuvan and his wife Linda said high costs led to their decision to close. They previously had a food truck, but they started a physical location last year.
“Dave and I want to thank all the people that came to support our dream, but with the increase of food prices we just cannot hold on any longer and made the hard decision to close!” the owners stated Thursday in a Facebook post. “So we hope to get to see you all this weekend to say thank you for your support and goodbye!”
Linda Yuvan expressed great sadness about the closing, adding that their customers meant a great deal to them. She told the Mon Valley Independent on Friday that they’ve received great support ever since the closure was announced.
“The community has been outstanding,” she said. “They have always supported us. I can’t say anything bad about the Mon Valley and the surrounding areas because they have come here. They have supported us, and like today, they have had kind words.”
SmokeShack Barbeque will be open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. today and Sunday at its 1025 Rostraver Road location unless it sells out sooner. The phone number is 724-998-0044.
The business completely sold out of food Friday. According to Linda Yuvan, they have been selling out for the past weeks, but after their closure announcement, more support started coming.
“It’s the cost of all the meat; we would have to raise our meat prices too high for our customers, and we just can’t see that,” Linda Yuvan said. “Unless we had a brick-and-mortar store where they could sit down and enjoy like a meal, not like takeout.”
Owning their own business was a dream come true for Dave and Linda. They said Ray Iacoboni, the owner of Val’s Beer Distributor, provided them with the opportunity to start a physical location.
“He (Iacoboni) doesn’t want us to close either,” Linda Yuvan said. “He says we’ve got really good food. We have the following. There’s nobody that really wants us to close. So many of our customers asked, ‘What will it take for you to stay open?’” Linda said as of now, they don’t have any plans to continue selling food after they close this weekend.
“This was our dream,” she said. “We put everything we had into this, and he’ll (Dave Yuvan) go back to driving a truck over the road, and I will look for a job.”
