In January of this year, we took a major step and we opened our new location on Buffalo Drive in Las Vegas. It is only 1 block away from our original location. After 7.5 years of running SUZUYA at our Durango location, we decided to move to a location nearly twice as big.

One of the reasons that we wanted to move to a new location was to bring back our crepes. We regretfully had to stop crepe making at the Durango location, mainly due to space issues. The space had reached its limits. It was pretty difficult to store equipment and enough ingredients, as well as being very difficult for our staff to move around in the small space. Although it was successful and business was going good, it was not productive and work lines were twisted…we decided it was time to take the next step.

We searched many locations all over Las Vegas. We wanted to find the best spot for SUZUYA. We were first interested in the Chinatown area. We were actually close to signing a lease at a new business plaza in Chinatown, however it just didn’t feel right. Even though the plaza looked amazing, in the center of the town, close to the Strip with easy access for tourists and in the “Mecca” of Asian restaurants in Las Vegas, and me and my partner, my husband Mike, were sure that we would fit there, something said don’t sign yet.

Then, we took a look at Downtown Las Vegas. This area was growing with more small businesses, unique and artisan shops and more restaurants. We thought it was a good fit. However, we weren’t familiar with the area. We didn’t have any specific area but we explored any possibility that presented itself in the Las Vegas Valley.

So it was Chinatown area or Downtown and then things just took a different turn…

We realized that we love the Southwest part of town where we built our customer base over the last 7.5 years. We wanted to continue to grow here and wanted to be closer to our customers. When we found this new location, it was a quick decision. Mike and I were both more excited than worried. We quickly went to see the space and talked to the owner at the time. Everything just clicked: a larger dining area with high ceilings, an easy to access location with plenty of parking, great neighbors like FUKU Burger, Firefly and Graffiti Bao and – a bonus for us dog lovers – a pet friendly patio. Done and done…now it was time for the big move!

We temporary closed the Durango location and we took 2.5 weeks to move to the new location. We moved a lot of equipment, ingredients… probably 90% of exciting stuff to one block away. The most difficult equipment was the showcase. It is made of huge glass, it needed special care to move. We painted the chairs in SUZUYA color brown and so on…
The last thing was inspections. We passed fire inspection, health inspection and were ready to go. Our new shop birthday was January 18th, 2020.

Stay tuned for the Durango location as it’s going to open as Shokupan Shop near future! It’s undergone some renovations and we can’t wait for our customers to see it. We haven’t been able to open it for while because of COVID-19 and need to focus on Buffalo location now. It will be open soon!