Award-winning celebrity chef and restaurant owner Jose Garces is selling his company and entering bankruptcy.
The Garces Group filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Camden, New Jersey. As part of the filings, Ballard Brands, a Louisiana restaurant and hospitality company, offered to purchase the assets of the Garces Group for over $5 million in cash and assumed liabilities.
The transaction is expected to close in 45 to 60 days.
“Jose Garces will continue to be the creative vision behind the restaurants, Garces Catering and the managed services business,” a spokesperson for the Garces Restaurant Group wrote in a released statement.
Ballard Brands owns the PJ’s Coffee franchise. Garces’ restaurants include Amada, Tinto, Village Whiskey and Distrito in Philadelphia as well as restaurants at the Tropicana Casino in Atlantic City. Garces also worked as a chef at Center City restaurants Alma de Cuba and El Vez.
He rose to fame over the years after winning the second season of the Food Network’s The Next Iron Chef competition.
The Garces Group experienced financial hardships after the 2014 closing of Atlantic City’s Revel Casino where Garces owned and operated four restaurants which generated approximately $2 million per year in profit. His company also experienced cost overruns after the Amada New York in Lower Manhattan closed last month.
