A Japanese restaurant in Menlo Park, California, has closed its doors after 23 years in business, with its owner saying Meta’s actions led to its downfall, according to SFGATE. Dashi Japanese restaurant reportedly served its last customers on Friday.
The restaurant was located in Menlo Park’s Belle Haven neighborhood and was known for quick service and its bento boxes. Owner John Bek opened Dashi Japanese Restaurant in 2004 and said it had built a loyal customer base over the years.
Bek said, per SFGATE, the closure came after years of financial strain, which he attributes to Meta’s expansion nearby and the company’s decision to pause a major redevelopment project across from his restaurant.
Owner says he used personal savings to keep the business open
Bek said he used his children’s college fund and his own savings to try to keep the restaurant running. “I started using my kids’ college fund, my life savings,” he said. “I’ve been completely drained of money just trying to keep the doors open.”
Bek said business was strong in the restaurant’s earlier years, when nearby office buildings brought in large lunchtime crowds. Longtime customer Joanna Martinez recalled that wait times could stretch up to an hour during peak periods. “If you didn’t get there before 11.30, you were waiting half an hour to an hour for a table,” she reportedly said.
According to Bek, the decline began after Meta moved its headquarters to the nearby former Sun Microsystems campus in 2011. He said that as the company grew, employees increasingly ate at on-site dining facilities rather than visiting local restaurants, which reportedly reduced lunch traffic for businesses in the area, including Dashi.
Bek said he had hoped a planned redevelopment project known as Willow Village, proposed across from his restaurant, would bring new customers to the area. The project was apparently pitched as including new homes, offices, shops and public spaces. However, the project’s timeline reportedly shifted multiple times over several years.
Meta confirmed this year that the Willow Village project had been put on hold, citing changing economic conditions. A statement posted on the development’s website, which has since been taken down, reportedly said: “After careful evaluation, it was determined that the current environment does not support advancing a project of this type and scale at this time.”
The announcement came after a round of layoffs at Meta and a reported shift in company focus toward artificial intelligence. Large-scale tech infrastructure projects elsewhere have similarly drawn pushback from nearby residents over their impact on surrounding communities.
Bek said that the Menlo Science and Technology Park, which he claimed supplied about 90 percent of his customer base, saw a significant drop in occupancy, which he said further hurt his business. “Facebook was going to build the Willow Village right across from Dashi,” he said. “And we’re still waiting. I’ve been waiting for 10 years.”
Bek said he was frustrated that he was not informed sooner about the project being paused. “If that wasn’t the plan, I could have done something to relocate while I was able to,” he reportedly said. “To Facebook, it may be not much, but to me, it’s my livelihood.”
Bek received a 60-day notice in May terminating his lease from LLBG Properties, a landlord that public records reportedly link to Meta-associated holdings, according to SFGATE. Bek said he had continued repaying a pandemic-era federal loan of roughly $500,000 even as his income declined. He also said he moved to a smaller home to cut costs and has begun preparing to sell his home to pay his employees.
Miguel Sanchez, owner of the neighboring restaurant Mi Taqueria, said he had a similar experience. “When we got the contract with Facebook, they said we will build a new shopping center,” Sanchez reportedly said. “But it never happened. If the lease increases more, we have to quit. We have to move from here.” Debates over whether such developments genuinely serve local communities have surfaced in other cases too, including one where residents questioned who benefits from a large AI facility built near their neighborhood.
Meta has disputed claims that it failed to support local businesses. A spokesperson for the landlord entity managing the property told SFGATE that Dashi received years of assistance, including reduced rent and financial accommodations totaling approximately $170,000. Adam Alberti, a spokesperson for Belle Haven Center, said in a statement the same outlet that “despite the unprecedented financial assistance from the retail center, Dashi chose not to pay rent or meet basic lease obligations for long periods.”
Alberti added that “the center is not in a position to permanently subsidize Dashi’s operations” and that “further concessions are not warranted.” Bek disputed this account, saying he always paid rent on time and received approval from the property manager on occasions when he could not.
He said the financial support offered did not make up for his losses. “Let’s just say if you take away $80,000 worth of sales, when you give $2,000 off, that’s not enough to survive,” he said.
Bek said he remains proud of what he built. “I am proud of my staff, I am proud of my customers,” he said, “but unfortunately I can’t fight Facebook.”
Published: Jul 6, 2026 04:10 pm