Boba Suite Tea House will be forced to close if owner Glenda Nunez and her staff cannot raise about $10,000 by April 15.

Nunez, a 2011 graduate of Syracuse University, bought the tea house located on South Crouse Avenue on March 15 and was told she had one month to make the first down payment of $25,000 to the previous owners. With her own funds, Nunez has already put forth a little more than $15,000.

Now at the two-week mark, Nunez said she is starting to panic because there are many changes she and the employees had planned to make to the business, such as adding food and more drink options to the menu, and now they may be unable to do so because of their looming payment deadline.

‘We don’t have enough time to see it all through,’ she said. ‘It is heartbreaking.’

Since Nunez became the owner, the tea house has already seen financial improvements, recently making its best sales to date. Deliveries have also jumped from about two to 20 a night since Nunez put the business on GrubHub.com.

She said, theoretically, if Boba Suite makes at least $1,000 a day, they will be able to accumulate just enough money in a little less than two weeks. Nunez said the tea house usually makes about this much daily, but she believes the fluctuating temperatures and rain have been keeping people from coming in and buying tea.

Though the business is doing much better under new management and with more advertising, as Nunez said the previous owners were ‘running it into the ground,’ it is still not enough to save the shop, she said.

In response to the situation, employees at the tea house have created a Facebook page, aside from the business’ regular page, to make the SU community aware of Boba Suite’s financial difficulties. Nunez said the staff is not just looking for donations, but for more people to come into the shop and purchase products.

Looking ahead, the monthly payments will be affordable, Nunez said. The problem is that it is difficult to come up with this amount of money in a month.

She and her staff are trying to reach out to the community or else the shop will be forced to close its doors.

Said Nunez: ‘It’s all 12 of us together trying to do this.’

rebarill@syr.edu 

Published on April 2, 2012 at 12:00 pm