{"id":57449,"date":"2025-11-20T08:57:15","date_gmt":"2025-11-20T08:57:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/57449\/"},"modified":"2025-11-20T08:57:15","modified_gmt":"2025-11-20T08:57:15","slug":"el-paso-businesses-cite-rising-expenses-falling-sales-in-latest-closures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/57449\/","title":{"rendered":"El Paso businesses cite rising expenses, falling sales in latest closures"},"content":{"rendered":"

EL PASO, Texas (KTSM<\/a>) \u2014 Chihuahua Charlie\u2019s, which opened earlier this year, announced its upcoming closure in a social media post, <\/a>writing that \u201cthe economy has caught up to us\u201d and that the owners could no longer continue operations.<\/p>\n

Matteo\u2019s Mexican Food also announced the closure of all four of its locations. In a statement, the restaurant cited rising inventory costs and a drop in sales as some of the reasons for the closures.<\/p>\n

Matteo\u2019s restaurants closing all 4 Borderland locations <\/a><\/p>\n

The Baked Bear, a national dessert chain, confirmed it is closing its West Towne Marketplace location after seven years in El Paso. The shop thanked customers for their support but did not provide a specific reason for the closure.<\/p>\n

The Baked Bear new to list of businesses closing in El Paso <\/a><\/p>\n

Other local businesses say they\u2019ve been feeling similar financial strain this year.<\/p>\n

At World Boba and Coffee, co-owner David Ramos said that while the business remains open, 2025 has looked different from their first two years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the first two years, we actually saw a steady increase, but this year, it\u2019s been a bit of a struggle,\u201d Ramos said.<\/p>\n

Ramos said costs for supplies, including coffee, imported syrups, rent and utilities have all increased. Despite that, he and his brother have chosen not to raise prices.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe decided not to raise prices\u2026 we value our customers, and we know they\u2019re dealing with higher costs too,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

UTEP economics professor Tom Fullerton said rising food costs, policy uncertainty and reduced customer traffic may all be contributing to recent closures.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne thing that\u2019s hurt those operators is that food costs have gone up substantially in 2025 due to the tariffs that were imposed by the White House shortly after January,\u201d Fullerton said.<\/p>\n

He added that the federal government shutdown, the longest in U.S. history, may have also played a role, with many federal employees going weeks without pay and cutting back on non-essential purchases.<\/p>\n

Fullerton said disruptions like that can take months for small businesses to recover from, and while some turnover is normal, it is too early to know whether more closures could follow in 2026.<\/p>\n

Ramos said that despite the uncertainty, he\u2019s focused on staying open and connected to the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf it weren\u2019t for our customers, we\u2019d probably be one of those closing as well,\u201d he said. \u201cWe thank all our customers from the bottom of our heart.\u201d<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTSM 9 News. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) \u2014 Chihuahua Charlie\u2019s, which opened earlier this year, announced its upcoming closure in a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57450,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[5908,31084,138,140,139,31086,24625,31085],"class_list":["post-57449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-el-paso","tag-closures","tag-david-ramos","tag-el-paso","tag-el-paso-headlines","tag-el-paso-news","tag-inventory-costs","tag-local-businesses","tag-tom-fullerton"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57449\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}