Red Cup Café closes with plea to support small businesses

The Red Cup Café in Harrow has closed after seven years, blaming a rise in rent and energy bills.

Owners Henal and Reena Chotai wrote on Twitter that the decision was "soul destroying" and "devastating".

The team said they had been hit with a rental increase and a new energy contract for electricity would have added £15,000 to their bills from early next year.

Red Cup Café tweeted: "Due to what we have had to endure over the last few years or so the pandemic, the current economic climate, drastic increases in food prices, lack of continued support from the government, overheads we are having to maintain etc, we have now been forced into this as we cannot raise prices to an unaffordable level just to cover these costs."

The Chotai's are both ambassadors for industry charity Hospitality Action and have been outspoken champions of the sector. They both attended the HospoDemo protest in Westminster last month.

News of the decision has led to an outpouring of support on social media. Hospitality Action chief executive Mark Lewis tweeted that he was "heartbroken" over the closure while AA Hospitality said it was "so sad to hear" of the news.

Gareth Thomas, Labour MP for Harrow West, wrote on Twitter: "Your café has lit up North Harrow since you opened and its closure is a huge loss to our community. It wasn't just the quality of the food you offered it was the sense of community you reinforced, the support for local charities."

The Red Cup Café team said they were working on bringing the business back in a new form and urged people to follow their social media pages for updates.

"We would like to give a massive thank you from the bottom of our grateful hearts, not just for your custom and support, but letting us share so many fabulous and unfortunately difficult moments with you," Red Cup Café wrote on Twitter.

The post added: "And one last request please…support your local small, independent business as much as you can."