ELLICOTTVILLE, N.Y. (WKBW) — A ski season staple, The Ellicottville Depot, is getting ready to reopen for its 47th season, and it’s first under new leadership. This year, operating under the Bar-Bill Tavern family of restaurants.
The Depot, as it’s more commonly known, was first opened in 1979 by Vicky Brown and her late husband Chris “Moose” Brown.
For 46 seasons, the business has been adored by locals and skiers alike, but when it closed its doors in March, worry set in.
“[It is an] Ellicottville institution,” Spencer Timkey, owner of the Boardroom Snowboard Shop, which is across the street, said. “Last thing anybody wanted to see was the building to get torn down or for it to turn into something hyper-commercialized.”
Just in time for ski season, John Crook, the owner of the iconic Bar-Bill Taverns, is hard at work getting the business ready to reopen for yet another Winter.
WATCH: Bar-Bill Tavern Owners set to reopen The Ellicottville Depot
“Our plan is we are keeping it ‘The Depot,’ so this won’t technically be a ‘Bar-Bill’ location. This will be under the Bar-Bill family of companies,” Crook said.
Crook will serve as the business operator. The building was bought by Holiday Valley.
“We want to continue what The Depot has been doing," Crook said. "They’re famous for pizza and wings, so that’s what we’re going to do. Obviously, the wings will be our wings. The rest of the menu, it kind of gives us the opportunity to do a few different things that we wouldn’t normally do in a Bar-Bill.”
Interior design-wise, Crook told me the plan is simple: Don’t change a single thing.
“We just want to make sure The Depot stays The Depot,” Crook said. “It would feel wrong to change 46 years of history.”
Crook told me the plan is to reopen to the public in late November or early December, just in time for ski season.
“It’s just going to be great to be able to walk through those doors again,” Trey Clauss, owner of The City Garage, said. “It’s going to be great, best wings in Buffalo. Best Wings in Western New York.”
