Inside the Relais de l'Arceau, dishes are piled up on tables. Small wine glasses, plates with burgundy borders, worn cutlery, carafes, chalkboards – everything is for sale, from the beer tap to the window blinds and even the ceiling lights. The working-class restaurant in the Deux-Croix-Banchais neighborhood in eastern Angers (western France) closed for good on June 20, more than 60 years after it first opened. Now, it belongs to a real estate developer who plans to demolish it and build a new four-story residence in its place.

Emmanuelle Geffard and Christelle Delias, 47-year-old twin sisters, had been running the place since 2009. They have decided to sell off all the equipment in an unprecedented "restaurant clearance sale." They are leaving with regrets but do not want to take anything with them. "From the beginning, the developers were after us. We thought we would retire here, but at some point, we told ourselves we needed to think things over," said Delias.

Their colleagues at Khephren, a few kilometers to the south, did not have that option. Their working-class restaurant closed on June 21, but without a buyer or a developer watching. Since the Covid-19 pandemic, a different epidemic has swept through the city: One after another, Le Colombier, Le Saint-Clair, Le Lorette, Au Laboureur, Le Mermoz and L'Aiglon have all shut down. Two more are up for sale.

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