The Crabby Shack, a beloved seafood restaurant in Crown Heights located at 613 Franklin Ave., is calling on its community to help save their restaurant.
Owned by friend duo Fifi Bell-Clanton and Gwen Woods, The Crabby Shack is an ode to the friends’ love for seafood boils. But since its opening over 12 years ago, the restaurant has been hit hard by rising food costs, bills and low customer engagement.
According to a 2025 report released by State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli, food prices in the New York City metropolitan area have risen more than 25 percent since 2019.
Now, the owners are looking for help through a GoFundMe to help them keep their doors open. The page was posted on Aug. 30 to raise about $35,000. The owners took to their social media page to explain the difficulties they were having. They invited past and new patrons of the restaurant to their 12th anniversary, which they said at the time would be one of the last times to celebrate together amidst their impending closure.
“It was a really hard year last year, and we came in this year optimistic, but it was a slow start," said Bell-Clanton. “I can see how things are already starting to slow down, and that worries me deeply."
According to Bell-Clanton, when a restaurant closes, it has to do so with a plan. "You can't just shut the doors one day. It doesn't work that way. And we don't want to close.”
The restaurant’s rough patch began at the beginning of 2025. They noticed the decline in visitors and would sometimes not have enough cash to pay employees or pay a bill.
The restaurant was known by neighbors for its delicious crab and lobster rolls, lobster mac-and-cheese and honey cornbread. But since the restaurant opened 12 years ago, Brooklyn's seafood scene has changed.
Since opening, the restaurant has seen its fair share of loyal customers come and go. Even with the new population of residents, it's been increasingly hard to market to the new audience, the owners said.
“There are so many new restaurants opening, and people get excited…so then they put us in the back of the mind,” Woods told BK Reader. "The neighborhood just changed so rapidly, people don't know us, and so they walk on by, and that absolutely affected us.”
Additionally, the rising costs of delivery platforms like DoorDash and Uber Eats and experiencing chargebacks from customers have hurt their business, they said. They instead encourage people to order on their website to avoid the extra surcharges and fees.
To help navigate these hardships, Bell-Clanton and Woods said they tried everything from connecting with influencers to spread the word, closing one extra day and even now hoping to change the aesthetic to fit the growing restaurant landscape.
They’ve noticed that many people aren’t interested in fast-casual restaurants anymore, and that instead, people want a space to chill, prefering spaces that have a bar, community activities and great aesthetics.
Bell-Clanton and Woods hope to incorporate more of that into their business.
The owners say their deadline to hit their financial goal is as soon as possible because winter is coming, which for them, has been an increasingly slow season.
Locals can support The Crabby Shack by ordering food from their website or donating to their GoFundMe here.
