Ed and Brittany Cabigao were 26 years old when they opened SOB, which was 11 years ago this month.

“We’d been in the restaurant business and thought we knew all about it,” Ed Cabigao said. “After the first day, we realized we didn’t know anything.”

Building permit filed for One Beale hotel

They saw a vacant space when they were Downtown for a South Main Trolley Night, knew it was perfect for what they wanted and went to the bank.

“They sort of laughed at us,” he said. “But my parents were gracious enough to co-sign for us, so we got our money and they just said ‘Don’t mess up.’”

They didn’t. They’ve made mistakes and they’ve learned, but business at SOB is 80% of what it was pre-COVID, SOBEast is opening in September, and the couple has purchased the old Ambassador Hotel on South Main, where they’ll move SOB in November.

The hotel purchase and SOB move was planned before COVID; they didn’t decide to renovate an old building, turn it into 10 apartments on top and move their restaurant to the ground floor during a pandemic. And their COVID story has ups and downs, but they understand they’re in much better shape than many of their fellow restaurateurs.

SOB — it stands for South of Beale — is a gastropub that opened with an emphasis on elevated bar food. But over the years, people started to come there more to hang out, Cabigao said. They’d eat, but it wasn’t really why they were there.

“My thinking is that when COVID happened and it forced all restaurants to close or go to takeout only, a lot of our customers rediscovered SOB food on its own,” he said. “They started coming to us for the food again.”

Takeout had been such a small part of the restaurant’s business that the room for growth was wide open. They were busy during the dining room shutdown, and after reopening in June, takeout didn’t decline much. What accounted for less than 5% of sales pre-COVID is now as much as 25%, and it’s made all the difference.

“That’s how we can be at 80%,” Cabigao said.

He gives a lot of credit to a video system he uses in the kitchen to expedite food orders. Instead of a single ticket going to the kitchen, a screen pops up for each cook.

Restaurants 2021: What’s ahead for Bari

“About 90% of restaurants do the old way, where two to four cooks are looking at one ticket,” he said. “We use technology that just sends the cook what they need to do, and it makes them faster because they only see what they need.

“We can have meals ready in eight to 15 minutes, depending on what it is. Before, food could take 45 minutes to get a meal out if we were really slammed. Now they can really bang it out.”

But the Cabigaos shut down three restaurants when COVID came. SOB is the only one to reopen. They also had Zaka Bowl, which after three years was starting to gain momentum, and Interim.

“We had three brands to manage and when COVID came, we took a step back and said ‘let’s think about this,’” Cabigao said.

They decided to close Zaka Bowl, but Interim was more complicated.

New health directive puts restaurants on notice; could close most places on Beale

The couple purchased the East Memphis restaurant with Nick Scott and Tony Westmoreland in 2016 with the understanding they wouldn’t operate it or really have anything to do with it. They were opening Zaka Bowl and had a baby on the way, so they wanted to be silent investors.

But things changed quickly. Scott and Westmoreland split their partnership; the latter kept Interim with the Cabigaos and Scott took Alchemy in Cooper-Young. In 2018, Westmoreland founded Tandem Restaurant Partners, and that wasn’t anything that interested the Cabigaos.

“When Nick and Tony split, that kind of forced us back into (Interim),” Cabigao said. “And then Tony left to start Tandem, which wasn’t something we wanted to do, so then Interim was all ours.”

They had a contract with Jimmy Gentry and Chris Thorn, who had owned P.O. Press in Collierville together, to operate it.

“Then COVID came and that ended,” Cabigao said. “We tried takeout at Interim but it didn’t do well, so we closed it down. But people started asking us about getting SOB food out east, so we reopened the Interim kitchen and within a few weeks, we were selling more SOB food from there than we were at SOB.

“That made it a lot easier to decide what to do. We just said ‘Let’s double down on what we know is successful and give 100% to that.’”

They were already committed to the lease on the Interim space and while Cabigao said there was an out, it would’ve been costly. Instead they put money into updating and redecorating the restaurant and will open the dining room in a couple of weeks with all the COVID restrictions.

Ryan Trimm faces a triple COVID challenge in an uncertain future

“Of course it’s not an ideal time, but when we started doing really well with the to-go food, it gave me confidence and optimism. COVID was the nudge we needed to breathe new life into the space. I think it was just time to make it a little more contemporary, more modern,” he said.

He said they’re grateful for loyal customers, a good staff and 11 years of experience that started out a little rocky.

“We learned from the school of hard knocks, but after a couple of years we figured out what we were doing,” he said. “Then we started saving money from SOB and we’ve invested it in the business. We’ve been really lucky. We know we’re blessed and we know others haven’t been so lucky.”

That’s not to say they haven’t felt the effects of COVID.

“It’s definitely affected us, too — of course it has. We had to close down two restaurants.

“But we’re looking at the bright side: Yes, we had to close down two restaurants but we like where we’re going. But if it hadn’t happened, we probably wouldn’t have changed anything. Interim would still limp along and Zaka Bowl would slowly grow. Now we’re doing something we’re really excited about.”