Community support carries Willow's Cafe through challenging circumstances

Whitney Willis knew she found the right place to open her restaurant when she saw the tree outside the space for rent at 436 Central Ave.

Willis, who spent more than two decades working at Popi’s Place on 17th Street, felt the time was right to branch out. She secured the Rosemary District property in July 2019 and decided to name her restaurant after her daughter, Willow.

She spent the next eight months preparing a menu, refurbishing the interior and navigating the city’s permitting system. Willis was able to get through it all, and Willow’s Cafe was ready to open for business. In March.

Just as she was finalizing the work necessary to welcome customers into her restaurant, Willis was presented an unforeseeable set of circumstances. The COVID-19 pandemic forced restaurants to close their dining rooms for six weeks. Even after the governor lifted the stay-at-home order, indoor capacity at restaurants was restricted.

What do you do when your plans to open a business are derailed by a once-in-a-lifetime virus? For Willis, there was only one option: find a way.

“I don’t sit there and debate — ‘Well, I could throw in the towel,’” Willis said. “I can’t.”

She opened Willow’s Cafe in April, offering carryout service while the shutdown order was still in effect. Under normal circumstances, Willis might have gone into the nearby apartment and condo buildings in the Rosemary District to drop off menus, but that wasn’t possible.

Instead, she focused her promotional attention right outside her front door. She was grateful to see the number of people who walk dogs in the neighborhood, and she pounced on any opportunity to promote her enterprise.

“We were basically begging people,” Willis said.

Beyond determination, Willis said a strong sense of community has been key to sustaining the restaurant. She’s gotten help from friends who volunteered to pick up shifts as servers and work for tips. The dishwasher occasionally moonlights as a babysitter for Willow during the day.

That communal support extends beyond the staff, too. Willis credited David Lough, a member of the Rosemary District Association, for sharing the restaurant’s menu with members of the neighborhood association and property managers. Workers at The Barber, the barber shop that neighbors Willow’s Cafe, encourage their customers to stop in next door.

Residents and businesses alike have been generous, Willis said.

“Everybody’s wanting to help each other out,” Willis said. “It makes me feel good. It makes me feel like I’m home.”

That’s not something Willis might have imagined herself saying about a neighborhood in Sarasota 30 years ago. Originally from an area in Palmetto that’s “all country and good ol’ boys,” Willis was apprehensive when she first had the opportunity to get a job in the city. But it didn’t take long — first at Popi’s Place, now in the Rosemary District — to learn that any fears she had about being snubbed by snobby Sarasotans were misguided. One of the side effects of the coronavirus is that she’s got to fight her urges to show gratitude.

“It’s hard not hugging everybody, because I’m a hugger,” Willis said.

There are more serious challenges, too. For every moment it looks like she might not be able to pay a bill, there’s been another where sales outpace her expectations. The future remains uncertain, but she’s determined.

“There’s days where I have to shut myself in the bathroom and cry a little,” Willis said. “But you pick yourself and dust yourself off and get back out there.”