QUINCY, ILL. -- Construction on the new Sprout's Inn is underway.
"Everybody keeps asking me when we're going to start the restaurant back up again and how much they miss the roast beef and the pie," displaced Sprout's Inn employee Randy Schwartz said.
It looks like a big whole in the ground now but in a few months it will sprout back into a family favorite.
"I'm wanting to keep the old sprout's feel, all the staples of Sprout's, the menu the same, the cozy warmth we had before," owner Jenny Wiemelt said.
Sprout's Inn in Quincy served hundreds of locals in the Quincy community everyday before it burned to the ground on June 14. Since then, Wiemelt says her staff has had to overcome one hardship after another and it doesn't seem to be getting any easier.
"I just found out last week that a lot of them just received their last unemployment check, which has really bothered me because I felt that they'd have a little more time to get back to Sprout's because there's just not that many jobs to be had," Wiemelt said.
Schwartz spent the last 20 years waiting tables at Sprouts. She says she's tried relentlessly to find a job but has had no such luck.
"One of the questions they ask me is, are you planning on going back to Sprout's? I'm not a liar and yes I am and I can't get a job. It makes it bad for me, but I've worked here this long and I plan on coming back," she said.
Those that have found jobs have taken on 2 or 3 jobs to equal the pay they received at Sprout's.
"It just breaks my heart for them that they don't have a job to go to, and that they have to pick up double the hours to support their families, people who've worked here this many years and to be shunned off like this," Wiemelt said.
Wiemelt says you can guarantee they'll all be welcomed back to Sprout's.
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