Specialty food market in downtown’s Chatham Arch to close

R2Go, a specialty market at 1101 N. College Ave., will close for good at the end of next week.

The last day of operation will be Jan. 19, owner Regina Mehallick told IBJ.

Mehallick opened R2Go in December 2014. It sells fresh to-go food items including entrees, soups, salads and side items and has a sandwich deli with locally produced eggs, dairy products, breads and other items.

Mehallick said she decided to close R2Go for a couple of reasons. The market had never become profitable in its four years of operation, and she couldn’t find a way to turn things around. “That’s been the $500,000 question. We were trying everything.”

The desire for a less intense work schedule was another reason Mehallick decided to close the market. 

From 2001 to 2016, Mehallick and her husband, Jim, also owned a restaurant called R Bistro at 888 Massachusetts Ave. The restaurant helped prove the viability of the 800 block of Mass Ave. Rooster's Kitchen now occupies the former R Bistro space, and other food-oriented businesses on that block include Mimi Blue, The Love Handle, Best Chocolate in Town, Mass Ave Wine and Natural Born Juicers. 

When she and her husband closed R Bistro, Mehallick anticipated that her work schedule would lighten up. But even with only one business to run, she still found herself working 60-hour, six-day work weeks.

“I thought that I would not be working quite as hard as when I had the restaurant, but that didn’t ever quite come through,” Mehallick said. 

Mehallick is a five-time James Beard Foundation Great Lakes region semifinalist, and in 2008, she earned a Cultural Vision Award from the Indianapolis news weekly Nuvo.

She said she hasn’t yet decided what she’ll do after closing R2Go. “I’d like to have a little bit of time to relax and then I’ll see what happens next.”