The Boloco restaurant on Fort Eddy Road in Concord closed Sunday permanently, and it will soon be replaced by another Boston-based chain, called b.good.
In a letter sent to Concord customers Friday, Boloco CEO and co-founder John Pepper wrote that he never would have made the decision to close down the burrito restaurant “were it not 100% necessary (which it is).”
Pepper said in a YouTube video that he decided to sell five locations to b.good – also including one in Burlington, Vt., and three in Massachusetts – to keep his company in business.
“If we didn’t do what we’re doing, I don’t know if we’d actually make it through the winter, when it does get cold and we do traditionally lose money,” he said.
The Fort Eddy Road location opened in 2008. Its employees “will be interviewing and onboarding with B.Good the day after we close,” Pepper wrote.
Pepper didn’t return a phone call Tuesday.
Leadership of the two companies has been intertwined. In the YouTube video, which was posted Friday, Pepper met with b.good founder Anthony Ackil on the side of Interstate 89 between Concord and Hanover. Pepper said he’s known Ackil as a business partner since 2002, helping to open the first of 45 b.good locations in 2004.
In a message directed at employees, Ackil explained that his first restaurant job was at Boloco, where he learned many of the systems that are in place now at b.good.
“I know transitions are hard. I know transitions are scary, but this is a good thing. I think we’re onto something that could be pretty special,” he said, adding that the restaurant plans to add 15 locations by March.
B.good has locations throughout the Northeast, mostly in Massachusetts. Its only New Hampshire location is in Nashua, having opened in September 2014.
In a promotional video on b.good’s website, Ackil said he hoped his restaurants would spread across the country and “change the fast-food industry forever” by partnering with local farmers to deliver “real food.”
Its menu includes kale and grain bowls, salads, burgers and sandwiches, french fries, smoothies and milk shakes.
In his letter to Concord customers, Pepper thanked the community for helping to sustain Boloco’s first location with no foot traffic.
“Everyone told us we were crazy because the Boston Market that preceded us was doing so poorly. But in time the Concord community came to support us more than I could have imagined,” he wrote.
It was unclear Tuesday when the b.good location would open.
Boloco closed less than four months after a competing burrito restaurant, Chipotle, opened down the road. Concord’s Main Street is also home to Dos Amigos Burritos, a New Hampshire-based chain that opened is third location in the city in May 2007.
(Nick Reid can be reached at 369-3325, nreid@cmonitor.com or on Twitter at @NickBReid.)