I suppose we could make this an Uptown is dead story. But honestly, the discourse is so tiring (and tired!) in my eyes because the answer is so obviously yes and so obviously no. Yes, Uptown is dead because of retail extinction, (strategically) vacant buildings, impossible rents, street reconstruction, and the long tail of pandemic-era crime (and the housing and drug crises that spurred it along). No, Uptown is not dead because the people who live there still love it fiercely despite its frayed edges; because they’re still going out for karaoke at the VFW and dates at Nightingale and midnight coffees among strangers at Caffetto; then matcha at Moona Moono and puppy dog tails at Isles Buns the next day. The Apple store was never going to save us anyway.
But Hennepin Avenue took another hit this week. Red Cow, which has sat just south of Lake Chipotle for the past decade, will close for good on June 1. (The other five Red Cows will remain open—the 50th & France location is currently undergoing a MartinPatrick 3 renovation, like the North Loop location did last fall.) Owner Luke Shimp told me that the decision was largely lease-driven. Though sales had largely rebounded after the early pandemic and the 2020 uprisings, they dropped 60 to 70 percent when construction on Hennepin began in 2024. (Incidentally, I used to live in an apartment directly across the street from Red Cow and can attest—for a while, the avenue was a muddy moat between its east and west edges.) Though construction on Hennepin finished in the fall of 2025, Shimp says that sales never recovered; the restaurant is still about 50 percent down.
A new five-year lease was simply too much to bet on. “I don’t think there’s a business in the world that can take a 60 percent sales cut for two years—it took hundreds of thousands of dollars to prop the restaurant up during that time period,” Shimp says. “We couldn’t keep investing and just hoping guests were going to return, that people’s habits would return to coming back to the Uptown area. It just wasn’t viable, and it wasn’t fair to our team to try to keep staffing the restaurant.” Red Cow will have zero job loss, however, as all employees are being offered positions at other locations.
Shimp’s sister, Stephanie Shimp, closed her Hennepin Avenue restaurant The Lowry last month. Though Stephanie declined to comment on the reasons for the closure at the time, her restaurant group Blue Plate cited “city-specific mandates and economics, as well as prolonged and disruptive Hennepin Avenue construction” in the announcement.
Luke Shimp says he understands that the city needed to upgrade infrastructure along Hennepin Avenue, but he felt that those needs ultimately outweighed the viability of the business corridor. “That’s always the challenge, trying to figure out that balance for business,” he says. “My perception is that many present council members don’t value business; they don’t understand that we’re the tax generators, we’re the traffic drivers. What I’ve shared with the city is that anytime you start adding barriers to entry, whether it be dining or retail, people start to contemplate whether they should go there—is it convenient? What are the difficulties? The neighborhood is in a constant state of change, but hopefully with the construction disruption behind us, maybe over time the neighborhood will turn back to a vibrant retail sector. But it’s going to take some business owners, retailers, restaurants, and the city making investments.” 2626 Hennepin Ave., Mpls.
Dining and Cooking