Base Camp Restaurant, the Colorado-themed eatery at 2611 W. Colorado Ave. in Old Colorado City, is closing after its last day of business on Sunday. The restaurant opened in March 2025 with a menu built around locally sourced ingredients and seasonal dishes, but owner and chef Matt Maher says rising costs and a downturned economy made it impossible to keep the doors open.
Maher announced the closure in a social media post on Sept. 26, according to the Colorado Springs Gazette. He encouraged customers to support other small businesses in the neighborhood. Base Camp’s menu highlighted Colorado ingredients, including Olathe corn, Palisade peaches, Pueblo chilies, bison and trout.
A Promising Opening Gave Way to a Difficult 2026
The Gazette reported that business slowed significantly beginning in spring 2026, when average gas prices in the greater Colorado Springs area climbed above $4 per gallon. It also reported that inflation and reduced discretionary spending weighed on the restaurant, and that the anticipated tourist-season boost did not arrive. Maher said rising costs and the downturn made it impossible to keep the business open.
Base Camp’s approach was also featured by FOX21 News. Chef and co-owner Matthew Maher described the concept simply: “Everything we do is Colorado-inspired.”
That same FOX21 segment detailed a menu drawing on Asian, European and Southwest influences, with shareable “exhibitions” combining five to 10 plates of food at a time. The station reported that the kitchen used Colorado brews and ice cream from neighboring Colorado Creamery for its root beer floats, leaning on local ingredients whenever possible. It's a detail that underscores how closely the restaurant's identity was tied to the regional food scene it was built to celebrate.
Part of a Broader Wave of Springs Restaurant Closures
Other reported 2026 closures included Roadrunner Pizza & Pasta, which closed at the end of August after operating inside the Venetian Village Shopping Center on North Hancock Avenue for 40 years, the Gazette reported.
Jax Fish House & Oyster Bar also closed its Tejon Street location downtown at the end of August, after opening there in January 2020. Till Neighborhood Bistro and Bar and Vine and Wheel both closed downtown in early September, though Garden of the Gods Market and Café remains open in that same shared space. Salsa Brava, meanwhile, closed on Dublin Boulevard during the summer, with Urban Egg expanding into the vacated space.
The Gazette reported that restaurant and retail closures have been less significant in Colorado Springs than in Denver, where office vacancies have climbed and employers have moved out of town in the years following the COVID-19 pandemic. It also attributed to the Colorado Restaurant Association an estimate that restaurants statewide keep about 3 cents or less of each dollar spent after labor, overhead and food costs. The Gazette account does not specify the period or sample behind that estimate.
What the cost figures measure
A separate, nationwide National Restaurant Association survey found that salaries and wages, including benefits, represented a median 36.5% of sales for full-service respondents and 31.7% for limited-service respondents in 2024. These figures describe survey respondents nationally, not Colorado restaurants specifically or Base Camp’s finances, according to the National Restaurant Association.
The association’s survey also put median income before taxes in 2024 at 2.8% of sales for full-service respondents and 4.0% for limited-service respondents, according to its report on restaurant performance. These national medians offer industry context; they do not establish the period or sample behind the separate Colorado Restaurant Association estimate cited above.
