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RIVERVIEW, Fla. — About a month after a Riverview restaurant was allegedly burglarized, the community is helping the business owner get back to normal.
Eggs Up Grill lost thousands of dollars in cash and equipment during the Labor Day weekend.
When the owner’s alma mater, Florida A&M University, heard about the incident, they knew they wanted to help.
On Friday night, it hosted a mixer to help drum up business and bring morale back to the restaurant.
Along with a healthy portion of eggs, the restaurant is serving up positivity.
“We want to be your happy place. We want us to make you smile. So that’s a part of our DNA. That’s our mantra,” said Priscilla Conyers, owner of Eggs Up Grill Riverview.
Conyers said some of that positivity was lost. In her surveillance video, a person can be seen taking a safe from the office, and then equipment from the dining room.
“We were devastated. We felt like it was definitely an invasion of our privacy,” Conyers said.
She said two server handheld devices — worth $2,000 each — are now gone, and there was a couple thousand dollars in the safe.
“My front of the house staff, my back of the house staff, we all worked extremely hard to be here to provide for the community. So, for something like that to happen to us, it just kind of took us out,” she said.
Friday night’s mixer helped to promote the restaurant and bring back some positivity to the staff.
“We’re hoping to basically patronize, drum up business to help fill the gap where the burglary may have caused some hardship from a financial standpoint,” said Laketra Claiborne, president of Florida A&M University Alumni Association’s Tampa Chapter.
Conyers said the community support has turned an unfortunate situation into a positive one.
“The community has really had our back. We absolutely love being in the Tampa Bay community, and we are here to stay. That situation will not hurt us anymore,” Conyers said.
The dining room was filled with FAMU’s colors and smiles once again.
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Tyler O’Neill
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