Owners comment on Los Cabos

The owners of the new Mexican restaurant Los Cabos, Ricardo Lopez and Tina Ordaz have been experiencing surprising results since they opened on February 5. There was a rough start with acquiring staffing at the beginning but they now seem to be in their stride. 

Ordaz said, “It’s been going really good. It was a lot busier than we expected. It’s slowed down a bit lately but I don’t know if it’s just the weather, but weekends are especially busy. It slowed down during the week, but not on the weekends.” 

Before opening the business, Ordaz said, “we weren’t necessarily prepared when we opened. We didn’t have the staff we needed, but we made it work for the first couple of weeks with what we have. It was just my husband and I and my daughter. Now we have more servers.”

They have been having challenges finding staff and using word of mouth to let people know. Ordaz added, “Now that we have other workers they can refer us to a reliable person.” 

Ordaz said, “The licensing and everything has been pretty easy. It took time, but when we got here, it took us nine days to open after we got here. The city has been very helpful in granting the liquor license. It was doable.”

Before they moved to Thermopolis they lived in Spearfish, South Dakota and operated a Los Cabos restaurant there. Los Cabos isn’t a franchise, but a family-owned business with multiple locations. Lopez’s aunt and uncle own the restaurants throughout Wyoming. There is one in Pinedale and another in Kemmerer under a different name. The South Dakota Los Cabos closed. 

Lopez’s uncle had been looking for another location for Los Cabos within the state and was supposed to buy Las Fuentes, which unfortunately burned down. In the process of looking for another restaurant, they connected with Tony Nettles. They signed a lease with Nettles to begin operation with the intent to purchase later. 

Ordaz said that the customer’s responses have been good. He added, “We have regular customers who come two to three times a week now. Some we know by name.” They said they feel like they are getting plugged into the community.

The biggest couple of goals they have is to open the bar full time and open the outdoor patio, but they would need more staff to do so. The bar is open only on the weekends and their current indoor capacity is 99 people, but the patio would allow even more patrons.