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By Elena Kadvany
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About this blog: I am a perpetually hungry twenty-something journalist, born and raised in Menlo Park and currently working at the Palo Alto Weekly as education and youth staff writer. I graduated from USC with a major in Spanish and a minor in jo...
(More)About this blog: I am a perpetually hungry twenty-something journalist, born and raised in Menlo Park and currently working at the Palo Alto Weekly as education and youth staff writer. I graduated from USC with a major in Spanish and a minor in journalism. Though my first love is journalism, food is a close second. I am constantly on the lookout for new restaurants to try, building an ever-expanding "to eat" list. As a journalist, I'm always trolling news sources and social media websites with an eye for local food news, from restaurant openings and closings to emerging food trends. When I was a teenager growing up in Menlo Park, I always drove up to the city on weekends with the singular purpose of finding a better meal than I could at home. But in the past year or so, the Peninsula's food culture has been totally transformed, with many new restaurants opening and a continuous stream of San Francisco restaurants coming south to open Peninsula outposts. Don't navigate this food boom hungry and alone! Feed me your tips on new chefs and eats and together we'll share them with the broader community.
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Ace of Sandwiches relocates in Palo Alto
Uploaded: Nov 6, 2017
After 12 years at a small storefront on El Camino Real in Palo Alto, The Ace of Sandwiches has fully moved to a new location at a Stanford University School of Medicine building on Arastradero Road.
Sunday was the eatery's last day of business at the original location. Owner Mario Navat said he decided to close after struggling to turn a profit against numerous pressures: a lack of foot traffic, insufficient parking, the rising cost of using third party delivery services like DoorDash and the increasing number of companies offering in-office lunch to employees. (Rent, amazingly, was not among his reasons for closing, Navat said.) Sales have been decreasing for more than a year, he said.
"I had to cut my losses before it got worse," Navat said Monday.
The Ace of Sandwiches ownership announced the closure of the original location on Instagram.
Navat said the Stanford School of Medicine approached him about seven months ago and asked if he wanted to operate a cafe out of an off-site research center at 1070 Arastradero Road. The appeal of business from about 700 university employees, not to mention the potential from surrounding businesses (Tesla, SAP and Pivotal are all close by) was too good to pass up.
Navat opened a new Ace of Sandwiches there with a limited menu in May. By the end of this week, the full menu from the original location will be available. He also plans to add "healthy fare" like salads, carb-free options and wraps.
The eatery is open to the public Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Starting later this month, Navat plans to stay open for dinner until 7 p.m.
Navat said in an ideal world, he'd be running a storefront in Palo Alto, but acknowledged that "would be very costly as far as rent and overhead."
It felt "bittersweet" to close the original outpost, which he said has been fueled over so many years by strong community support.
"It was like our baby," Navat said. "But if we're not open to change, then we won't be able to survive."
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