The Beaverton Tavern is famous for its big – rather, colossal – Hometown Burrito, and offers bar food, burgers and appetizers with a Tex-Mex feel. Established 50 years ago, the tavern closed for a while, but then Robin Smith-Martin and her family decided to re-open the iconic hometown gathering spot.

“In a greater sense, the big thing for us was to bring back this staple in our community.

The Beaverton Tavern definitely brings the community together – we are sponsors for a lot of the local teams, and Friday nights we feed the football team,” said Taylor Eaton, Smith-Martin’s daughter.

COVID slowed down suppliers and contractors, and renovations to the tavern took about one and a half years to complete. In the meantime, the family reached out to the Michigan Small Business Development Center and consultant Jeff Punches.

Punches connected them with a CARES Act funded MI-SBDC consultant who specializes in efficiency, food pricing, how to set up the bar, how many tables to have and overall layout. “We renovated the restaurant and did a whole new redesign to make it more efficient. Having those restaurant resources was definitely a huge thing for us,” said Smith-Martin.

Future plans for Beaverton Tavern expansion include adding a second floor for venue rooms and a rooftop deck.

“We are very excited to have Beaverton Tavern open back up in such a small community. We want to say thank you to the MI-SBDC and especially Jeff for giving us this opportunity.

We were brand new in this, and couldn’t have done it without them,” said Smith-Martin.

Learn more about Beaverton Tavern here.