Embattled Glu restaurateur seized control of Northern Liberties Mexican hotspot Añejo on Cinco de Mayo
The restaurant’s management said that the move cost $20,000 in lost sales. The restaurant, facing eviction, owes nearly $250,000 in back rent and fees.
What, if anything, could cause a Mexican restaurant to close on Cinco de Mayo?
That question was a reality for Añejo in Northern Liberties, which was dark for most of Monday — typically, its biggest sales day of the year — after embattled restaurateur and former investor Tim Lu staged a coup by changing the locks and the point-of-sale system, then bringing in his own team to run dinner service.
“He pretty much stole the restaurant,” said Benny Ramos, Añejo’s general manager. “It was a remarkable move.”
Lu’s bold gambit — which was carried out in front of Añejo staffers — was the latest round in a dispute with his onetime partners. The restaurant, meanwhile, is facing eviction and owes nearly $250,000 in back rent and fees, according to court records.
Lu was the co-founder of Glu Hospitality, the now-defunct restaurant group that operated six locations of the Bagels & Co. chain and a portfolio of nine Instagram-forward restaurants, including Figo in Northern Liberties and Chika in Center City, before shutting down in March amid probes from the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Pennsylvania State Police over unpaid wages and attempts to serve alcohol without proper liquor licenses. Lu also faces a separate lawsuit from a former Glu Hospitality investor who alleges that Lu assaulted him after he pressed Lu to return a $100,000 deposit.
» READ MORE: The once-high-flying restaurant group Glu Hospitality has shut down amid wage-theft allegations and lawsuits
Ramos said that Lu no longer has a business relationship with Añejo, and that the establishment, in the Piazza complex at 1001 N. Second St., has no affiliation with Glu. But Lu’s name is on the lease, and he is also listed as the sole owner of the business’ liquor license.
Lu helped open the third location of the swanky New York City Mexican restaurant in Philly in 2020, splitting ownership with a business partner and the Añejo restaurant group, according to an operations agreement reviewed by The Inquirer. That relationship soured in 2024, when Añejo took Lu to arbitration, attempting to remove him from the partnership over allegations that he embezzled funds.
Lu denies the embezzlement allegations and said he’s been boxed out of Añejo’s operations despite being on the hook for rent and liability insurance, since his name remains on the lease. That, Lu said, is why he showed up at 11 a.m. on Cinco de Mayo with a locksmith, new locks, and a plan to regain control of the restaurant’s point-of-sale system.
“With everything going on, [Añejo] wants to distance themselves from me, and I understand it. But they’re throwing me under the bus without also taking responsibility,” Lu told The Inquirer. “If I owe this rent, how is it that I have no benefits from the business?”
» READ MORE: A former Glu Hospitality investor alleges that he was assaulted when he asked for his money back
‘He kind of bullied us out of there’
Ramos said Añejo lost out on at least $20,000 in the day’s receipts and had to cancel over 200 dinner reservations. Now, he said, the restaurant is closed for the foreseeable future as they work to settle the dispute.
“We hope to continue our lease negotiations with the landlord and resume operations as Añejo under a new lease,” a spokesperson for the Añejo Restaurant Group said in a statement. “We are also working with the [Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board] to correct the ownership names listed on the liquor license. We will make an announcement on social media when we’re able to regain possession of the space, but until then anything being served is being done so unlawfully.”
Gillian Peterson, a server, showed up at Añejo on Monday morning expecting to take home at least $400 in tips. Instead, she said that she and the rest of Añejo’s staff were forced to stop work 20 minutes into lunch service as Ramos and Lu argued over who had the right to change the locks and manage the restaurant’s transaction system.
“We couldn’t ring in orders. We couldn’t run tabs. We couldn’t do anything,” Peterson said. “I was trying to handwrite tickets to give to the kitchen and bar. … I was really upset that we had to shut down but it wasn’t possible to keep going with everything Tim Lu had done.”
Ramos said he told staff that he would close the restaurant for the day and would pay them regardless, but then he started receiving reports around 6 p.m. Monday that Lu was running dinner out of Añejo with a team that had never worked there.
Peterson said she didn’t recognize a single bartender or server when she stopped by Añejo that evening with Jared Navarro, a coworker, to see what was going on. “They were serving our food, our alcohol,” Peterson said.
Together, they tried to inform patrons that they were being served by what Navarro called “scab” labor. The thin trickle of diners didn’t seem to care, she said.
Lu confirmed that he reopened Añejo for dinner with his own crew because it was Cinco de Mayo. He declined to explain how he sourced the replacement staff, but said that all Añejo employees had been offered the opportunity to work that night.
Navarro doesn’t remember it that way. A food runner at Añejo since 2021, Navarro said the restaurant’s business had been slow recently, so he was counting on his Cinco de Mayo tips.
Lu “was acting very condescending and very smug the entire time he was in the building,” Navarro said. “He kind of bullied us out of there.”
Whose lease is it anyway?
The dispute between Lu and Añejo stems from a pending eviction. The Post Bros., the restaurant’s landlord, filed eviction paperwork against Lu and UC Hospitality Group — the LLC established for Philly’s Añejo location — in October 2024. As of April 2025, Lu and UC Hospitality owe more than $246,000 in back rent and other fees, according to court documents.
“Some of Tim’s actions made it impossible for the restaurant to pay rent in time,” Añejo Restaurant Group’s spokesperson said in a statement. “Añejo was working with the landlord to renegotiate a new lease directly with Añejo, and rectify the past issues” when Lu began contesting the eviction, which had been stalled leading up to the day of the attempted takeover.
Lu contends that it wasn’t necessarily his job to pay the rent. The Añejo Restaurant Group’s spokesperson said the group was solely responsible for operations, management, and staffing.
“I signed the lease. I have a responsibility,” Lu said. “But it wasn’t my role to pay the rent. I didn’t even have access to the money to do it.”
Inquirer Food reporter Mike Klein contributed to this article.