Foxtrot fans missing their morning fix of breakfast tacos and coffee, your wait is almost over.
The upscale Chicago-based convenience store and cafe chain that closed abruptly in April before filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy is set to reopen in the Gold Coast Thursday, the first of more than a dozen former Foxtrot locations slated to welcome back customers by spring.
Backed by a New York-based investment firm, Foxtrot co-founder and former CEO Mike LaVitola is relaunching and enhancing the core concept, unfettered by the debt, aggressive expansion and a failed merger that brought down the chain after a decade.
“Our new coffee and food menus are a true reflection of Foxtrot’s founding principle: taking the ingredients we’re passionate about, partnering with the best purveyors, and making them a special part of our day—and yours—every day,” Foxtrot Chairman LaVitola said in a news release Tuesday.
In addition to the signature breakfast tacos and specialty coffees, the new Foxtrot menu will feature panini sandwiches, salad bowls, fresh-baked cookies and other offerings throughout the day.
LaVitola co-founded Foxtrot in 2014, based on a concept for a high-end, locally sourced convenience store he developed while pursuing his MBA at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Launched as an online service, Foxtrot opened its first bricks-and-mortar store in the West Loop the following year.
Expansion followed as the convenience stores gained traction, with its one-hour delivery service flourishing during the pandemic. But like many startup founders, LaVitola was ousted as CEO by the company’s board in early 2023, as Foxtrot’s steep growth trajectory proved unsustainable in the post-pandemic retail landscape.
One year later, Foxtrot was out of business.
The stores closed suddenly in April, four months after Foxtrot and Dom’s Kitchen & Market, another Chicago grocery startup, merged under a new corporate banner, Outfox Hospitality, with plans to leverage synergies and continue to expand both brands.
Foxtrot had grown to 33 locations, including 15 in Chicago, with the rest in Texas and Washington, D.C., when it shut down. Dom’s, a downsized neighborhood market concept launched in 2021 by longtime grocery executive Bob Mariano, had two Chicago locations and its own ambitious expansion plans.
Workers at all of the locations were immediately let go, some mid-shift, spawning lawsuits that their dismissals violated required federal and state warning notices. The new Foxtrot owner is not a party to those lawsuits.
In May, Outfox filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in a Delaware court. The assets of Foxtrot were purchased at auction for $2.2 million by Further Point Enterprises, an early investor in the startup, with plans to relaunch the brand. The first move for the new owner was to bring back LaVitola.
While LaVitola told the Tribune in June he planned to open a dozen former stores this summer, the relaunch is moving at a much slower pace.
First up is the location at 23 W. Maple Street in the Gold Coast, which will open its doors Thursday with free coffee from 6 to 10 a.m. Foxtrot plans to reopen its Old Town store next, followed by locations at Wrigley Field and Willis Tower before year’s end, a company spokesperson said.
Overall, there are plans to reopen 11 previous Foxtrot locations in Chicago and three in Dallas by spring of 2025.
rchannick@chicagotribune.com