{"id":132166,"date":"2026-06-07T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-07T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/long-standing-cortez-restaurant-once-upon-a-sandwich-sold\/"},"modified":"2026-06-07T05:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-06-07T11:00:00","slug":"long-standing-cortez-restaurant-once-upon-a-sandwich-sold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/long-standing-cortez-restaurant-once-upon-a-sandwich-sold\/","title":{"rendered":"Long-standing Cortez restaurant Once Upon A Sandwich sold"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Once
Once Upon A Sandwich\u2019s new owners have yet to release their plans for the restaurant, but they have applied for a liquor license under the business name \u201cPitchers on Main LLC.\u201d (Ann Marie Vanderveen\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

After months of closure, Once Upon a Sandwich announced its official sale to new owners Thursday. The establishment, with its mom and pop origins hiding behind a yellow exterior and thatched roof, has been a mainstay of Cortez\u2019s Main Street since 1990.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was old and crowded, but it was part of Cortez, what the old Cortez was,\u201d former Mayor Mike Lavey said.<\/p>\n

Lavey and his wife, Gail, frequented the joint while it was under the original ownership of Carolyn and Rick Hessom. In 2024, the Hessoms retired and sold the restaurant to Cameron and Kari Watson, who revamped it with a fantastical theme.<\/p>\n

The Watsons put the eatery on the market in April this year and, after 41 days, it sold for $390,000. They declined The Journal<\/em>\u2019s request for an interview.<\/p>\n

Businesses coming, going and staying on Main Street<\/div>\n

Pennie Sanford, who\u2019s owned Pippo\u2019s Cafe on Main Street for 28 of its 68 years, has witnessed many periods of change in downtown Cortez, including the closing of El Grande Cafe and numerous retail pop-ups.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople take over the same buildings, and they seem to put stuff in there,\u201d Sanford said. \u201cSometimes they work, sometimes they don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

But her restaurant, with its homely Americana aesthetic, has remained, surviving through word-of-mouth recommendations and community support. The cafe, which plans to celebrate 70 years in 2028, evokes a working class atmosphere dominated by laborers and families seeking a spot to wind down and enjoy classic comfort food and coffee.<\/p>\n

When Lavey first moved to Cortez in 1990, mom and pop operations like Once Upon A Sandwich, El Grande Cafe and Pippo\u2019s dominated Main Street. Now there\u2019s a mix of newer businesses bringing more modern designs and a wider variety of food options to the center of town.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s nice having the new places with their young, upscale clientele, and having the old places where you could go and feel comfortable and have a good meal,\u201d Lavey said.<\/p>\n

Helen West, Cortez\u2019s community and economic development specialist, said she\u2019s been delighted to see Main Street more populated by businesses in recent years.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am very happy that, in the last couple years, we\u2019ve also seen more infill in our downtown district,\u201d West said. \u201cWe\u2019re seeing more boutiques and experiential kind of places to go shop, which is somewhat of a return to that \u201970s and \u201980s community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Challenges, successes and support on Main Street<\/div>\n

Local businesses \u2013 particularly restaurants \u2013 can face a plethora of challenges, from limited patronage to a short tourism season, West said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a mixed income community, but relatively low on the socioeconomic scale when compared to the rest of Colorado. So restaurants are already struggling, and we are a very seasonal area pertaining to tourism,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

However, she said she\u2019s been impressed with the ability of legacy businesses \u2013 those that have run through generations of owners \u2013 and new operations alike to thrive in the small, rural community.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m actually surprised that we don\u2019t have more turnover, especially in our restaurants,\u201d West said, citing the success of more contemporary businesses like Loungin\u2019 Lizard and Stonefish Sushi.<\/p>\n

Keeping long term businesses alive is particularly important to Cortez residents who admire the area for its small-town Western feel, West said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese businesses not only provide steady jobs, but years of trusted credibility within the community, long term community memory, and knowledge to our business community,\u201d West said. \u201cAnd they also anchor that community in a shared cultural heritage.\u201d<\/p>\n

What\u2019s next for Main Street<\/div>\n

Lavey will always miss the Hessom\u2019s era at Once Upon A Sandwich. For him, it was the people that kept him coming back every Sunday after church for some chat and a green chili stew.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t convenient to get in there. It was narrow and crowded. It wasn\u2019t high class, but it felt so comfortable, and we never left that place without feeling uplifted,\u201d Lavey said. \u201cIt\u2019s like jumping back in time for a while, and then visiting your relatives \u2013 your aunt and uncle and your friends.\u201d<\/p>\n

The restaurant won\u2019t remain \u201cOnce Upon A Sandwich.\u201d New owners Paul Adams and Paul Beekler applied for a liquor license from the city under the name \u201cPitchers on Main LLC.\u201d While they have yet to release their plans, they face months of anticipation, and a few predictions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that people are trying to get back to that kind of atmosphere: the small town, home cooked food, friendly kind of place, and I think that more of them are probably going to start popping up,\u201d Sanford said. \u201cMaybe, who knows?\u201d<\/p>\n

avanderveen@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Street, some things change and others remain the same<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":132167,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[431,28,198,29,450,6419],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-132166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-business-general","tag-headlines","tag-history","tag-newsletter","tag-restaurant-and-catering","tag-tj-trueanthem"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/132167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132166"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=132166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}