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Transforming the second floor of the Gallo Restaurant in Patchogue from office and storage space to a catering facility wasn’t exactly a no-brainer of a business decision.
Among other things, it involved losing tenants, upgrading sprinklers, replacing a staircase that had led to the street and installing a $25,000 elevator that was required for the move to be ADA compliant. But the owners did it.
Now they’re booking at least one event every weekend.
David Bustamante, who owns the restaurant with his parents and sister, said they started working on the East Main Street restaurant’s upstairs in 2008.
“We gutted the whole place upstairs, except the fire wall,” he said. “It was a bunch of ideas from all of us. And it just came together and it became a nice party room. But it took tinkering.”
“What’s nice about the hall upstairs is that it’s a whole floor divided into three rooms, so you’re not confined to one dining area with a rollout bar,” he continued.
“If you have music playing and people dancing, you can have people at the bar watching the game. You can definitely hide yourself. A lot of other places you have one room, and that’s it — it’s there or you go outside. But the rooms still connect and there’s a nice flow of motion.”
The catering space at Gallo holds up to 100 people. Click here for menu and pricing.
Featured photo caption: Gallo’s upstairs dining room set up for a baby shower. (Credit: Gallo courtesy photo)
