What’s hot on Independence Avenue?
Independence Day was good for at least one Independence Avenue restaurant: Pho Hoa Vietnamese Restaurant at 1447 Independence Avenue. Owner Spike Nguyen put a sign on his front door the day before, stating that he would be open on July 4 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. “But people kept coming in, even after 2 p.m.,” Nguyen says. “We didn’t close until after 6 p.m.”
Nguyen celebrated the first anniversary of his franchise venue last month by installing another air-conditioning unit. The hot weather, he says, is hurting his business, although his smoothie trade has increased to the point that he bought an industrial-strength snow-cone machine to provide enough crushed ice for his fruity concoctions.
Nguyen has put plans to open his second Pho Hoa location on ice, as it were, for at least another eight months. He’s focused right now on building business on Independence Avenue. He still has no signage facing Independence Avenue, and he’s getting a new neighbor in the front half of the building. The awning announces the upcoming restaurant as the Capital Cafe. “It’s going to be a Somalian restaurant,” Nguyen says.
Next month, Spike Nguyen is introducing a new promotion: “The Spike Challenge.”
