Barbecue restaurant closes Johnson County location after 10 years. All is not lost

Burnt End BBQ has closed its Overland Park location, days before it opened another in De Soto .

Both were expected to stay open, said pitmaster Stephen “Smokey” Schwartz, but expanding the small Overland Park location while opening another restaurant proved difficult.

“In order for us to do what we wanted to do, we’d have to make some really huge reconstructive changes to the building,” he said. “It was too much to do two at one time.”

So, after 10 years, the Burnt End BBQ team decided to abandon its Overland Park spot at 11831 Metcalf Ave.

A little more than a week ago, the De Soto location opened in a former Burger King at 34071 Commerce Drive in De Soto, right off Kansas 10 and Lexington Avenue.

So far so good at that location.

“We’ve had great feedback from everybody in that area,” Schwartz said.

The Burnt End BBQ team is still looking for another location in Johnson County. The next will have a full bar and patio, like in De Soto.

“The scouts are never stopping, that’s for sure,” Schwartz said.

Burnt End BBQ is owned by parent company PB&J Restaurants , which also owns YaYa’s Euro Bistro and a few Red Robin and Starbucks locations.

Most of the employees at the Overland Park restaurant moved to the De Soto location, Schwartz said. Others were given the opportunity to work at the Crown Center location or other PB&J restaurants.

Longtime barbecue lover Schwartz began working for PB&J in 2005. He opened Burnt End BBQ in 2011 at 11240 W. 135th St., which relocated to Metcalf Avenue three years later. Another opened in Crown Center in 2020.

At the beginning of the year, Burnt End BBQ also opened a restaurant in Conway, Arkansas.

“Our biggest thing is being part of the community,” Schwartz said. “Not just being another restaurant in the city.”

Menu favorites include “the chop” — a brisket and burnt ends sandwich — and smoked ribs, as well as its bowls, including the vegan barbecue bowl made with plant-based chorizo, wild rice, onions, peppers and pico de gallo.

Meanwhile, Harp Barbecue is moving out of Raytown and over to Overland Park, at 12094 W. 135th St., near Quivira Road. It’s expected to open in late August or early September.