Yet more Houlihan’s close suddenly in NJ

It wasn’t even two months ago when I wrote about the closings of Houlihan’s restaurants in Weehawken and Lawrenceville. Now it’s happened again.

In closings that the Woodbridge Patch describe as abrupt, the Woodbridge and Hasbrouck Heights locations went dark Sunday.

Houlihan’s parent company released a statement that was reported on NJ.com and read in part, “There is never a good time to close a restaurant, but due to the wind down of the bankruptcy estate, the last day of business for both of these locations was December 28. HRI is doing everything possible to minimize the impact to affected team members by working to place them at different continuing locations and reaching out to local restaurant companies on behalf of the team members."

Yes, bankruptcy.

The plan is to keep the remaining New Jersey locations open throughout the process. Word has it from Fortune that a restaurant group called Landry’s put in a $40 million bid to buy them out. They also operate such places as Joe’s Crab Shack and Rainforest Cafe. Fans of Houlihan’s will just have to wait and see where the process takes them.

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