This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Dylan Alverson, 45, who owns Post Modern Times, a pay-what-you-can restaurant in Minneapolis. It has been edited for length and clarity.
I started working in restaurants when I was 14 in northern Wisconsin.
My parents had moved there from the coasts to live on a self-sustaining property, so I grew up raising food, helping my mom cook, and developing an appreciation for ingredients long before I thought about restaurants as a career.
For years, cooking was what allowed me to travel. I worked everywhere from casual diners to acclaimed restaurants, never thinking I’d eventually own one.
That changed after I worked at a worker-owned restaurant in Minneapolis. Because everyone shared responsibility, I learned every side of the business. I started thinking, “If I ever opened my own place, here’s what I’d do differently.”
At 24, I moved to Seattle and, with a business partner, scraped together about $12,000 to open a café. I was living in the restaurant’s storage room when I found out I was about to become a father.
Eventually, I realized I couldn’t run the restaurant and be the kind of parent I wanted to be. I left.
A few years later, while working at a struggling bicycle shop, the owner offered to sell me the business for $1. It was easier to offload it at a loss than try to sell it. I turned it around during the recession, sold it a few years later, and moved back to Minneapolis.
Almost immediately, I stumbled upon the space that would become Modern Times. I signed the lease the same day.
From the beginning, I wanted it to reflect the neighborhood. I wrote all the recipes, sourced local food, turned part of the building into artist studios, and tried to create what people now call a “third place” — somewhere neighbors could gather, not just eat.
Dylan Alverson
The restaurant grew steadily. By the year before this latest transition, annual sales had reached about $1.3 million.
Then everything changed.
The pandemic, inflation, and rising labor costs completely rewrote the economics of running an independent restaurant. Even though we were busy, I couldn’t find a sustainable profit margin. I was working 7 shifts a week, fixing equipment myself, carrying flour up the stairs until I developed hip problems, and sometimes borrowing money to make payroll.
I wasn’t the only one. Every restaurant owner I talked to was dealing with the same math.
Late last year, after federal immigration raids shook our neighborhood, we started offering free meals with help from a local grant. I noticed something immediately: People who needed food often wouldn’t ask for it.
Then Alex Pretti, our neighbor, was killed during an immigration operation. Our community was reeling, and everyone was angry, so we took prices off the menu as part of a tax strike — we weren’t charging for meals and therefore weren’t generating sales tax.
It was a way to fight back and also provide comfort to our neighborhood, so anyone could get a hot meal if they needed one.
After seeing the spark of hope that change caused, we haven’t gone back. People can now pay whatever they can afford. Or nothing at all.
The response surprised me
Supporters donated about half a million dollars over the winter after our story spread online. Four months later, we’re still operating without menu prices.
We’re serving about 155 meals a day. Around 90% of those meals aren’t accompanied by a donation.
We’re not trying to maximize profits anymore. We’re trying to build a restaurant that’s financially sustainable, pays staff a living wage, and ensures anyone in the neighborhood can eat.
Ironically, we’re in a better financial position than we were before.
For the first time in years, I’ve been able to pay myself about $50,000 annually, and we’re paying employees $25 an hour, with the goal of reaching $30 an hour.
We’re still figuring it out. We’ve added guidelines to ensure the space remains welcoming for everyone, and we’re constantly adjusting how we distribute meals to serve as many people as possible.
I don’t pretend this is a finished model, but I do think restaurant owners need to stop pretending everything is fine.
Small business owners carry a lot of shame when things aren’t working. I think we need to be more honest with each other. The traditional model isn’t working for a lot of independent restaurants anymore.
If we want neighborhood businesses to survive, we have to be willing to imagine something different. And if we figure it out, I don’t want to keep it to myself. I’d give the model away. That’s the whole point.
