The hunt for a new location continues for The Tomato, a longtime Denton restaurant once housed within the eclectic Fry Street area.

DRC/Gary Payne

Mike and Becky Slusarski, shown in this May 31, 2006, file photo, are looking for a new location for The Tomato after plans fell through to relocate to the Denton Crossing Shopping Center.

After closing their Fry Street restaurant for the last time at midnight May 13, restaurant owners Mike “Ski” Slusarski and his wife, Becky, were making final plans to relocate to the Denton Crossing Shopping Center off Loop 288.

But their plans fell through.

“Another tenant came along that the landlord chose to go with over The Tomato,” said Alex Payne, co-owner of Axis Realty Group in Denton. Payne has volunteered his time to find a new home for The Tomato — one of several businesses asked to relocate after a Houston developer bought most of a block across from the University of North Texas last summer. United Equities Inc. has plans to raze the existing buildings and build a new shopping center featuring architectural styles from the 1920s, when the original buildings were built.

The property purchase and recent business closings have generated an outcry among some residents and college students who wanted to maintain the eclectic feel of the area. Save Fry Street, a grassroots organizations created after the property sale, has worked with the developer to preserve the look and feel of Fry Street.

Though disappointing, the recent change in plans means they just haven’t found the right place, Mike Slusarski says.

“We’re still looking,” he said. “I still have confidence something will turn up.”

The longtime restaurant owner, who has been a part of the Denton community since 1984, wants to stay close to his original location at the corner of Hickory and Fry streets, where he catered to collegiate tastes. The restaurant originally opened as The Flying Tomato in 1984, with the couple working as managers. They bought the iconic establishment in 1996, renaming it The Tomato in 1998.

“I’m hoping that there was some place ready for us to move into or someone has a space and they’ll finish it out for us,” Mike Slusarski said.

Existing restaurant locations are rare, Payne said, adding that a pizza restaurant would have more difficulty finding a shopping center that didn’t already have a pizzeria located in it. Restaurants and other similar businesses often have non-compete clauses as part of contracts to limit competition within shopping centers, he said.

“A pizza place has to have a lunchtime crowd,” Payne said, adding that a location near the university or downtown would be the most logical. “It needs to be located where people go for lunch. That’s why other restaurants have problems in bedroom communities,” he said.

Another challenge facing The Tomato is the continuing trend in pizzerias toward delivery and online services, and offering buffet meals.

“You don’t see that many sit-down pizza places,” Payne said.

Slusarski said he and his wife are continuing to meet with people and trying to put the word out. They also are looking for jobs in the interim.

“We don’t know, as of right now, what we’re going to do,” he said. “I guess we’re kind of sitting in limbo.”

Good restaurant locations don’t come around very often, but they do come around, Payne said.

“We’re just going to have to find that right location for them,” Payne said. “It’s better to wait for that right location instead of going into the wrong location.”

DAWN COBB can be reached at 940-566-6879. Her e-mail address is dcobb@dentonrc.com