Prezzo Italian restaurant in Mere Green one of 46 outlets hit by cost of living crisis

A popular Italian restaurant in Mere Green has permanently closed its doors. It is a blow for the area, which has only recently seen all of the units at the prestigious Mulberry Walk development fully let.

Prezzo in Mere Green is one of 46 closures announced by the Italian chain on Monday, April 24. The Mere Green restaurant’s website says the venue has permanently closed.

The firm said it was part of a ‘strategic review of its business’, where it said it would focus on its ‘better-performing restaurants’ to ‘ensure long-term, sustainable growth’.

The firm said it has informed all its affected employees as part of a consultation process and said it will look to ‘redeploy as many staff internally as possible and will support others in finding new opportunities’.

Prezzo said it has seen keys costs rise in the last year including more than doubling of utility bills which now represent nine per cent of total revenues as well ‘continued inflationary pressures’ on key ingredients,