The restaurant industry is not for the faint of heart—an “evolve-or-die” mentality is often necessary. That’s the approach David Hensley, co-owner of Avivo Brick Oven Pizzeria in Wichita, Kansas, is taking as he converts his full-service restaurant into a fast-casual operation.

Even more impressive? Hensley thinks the necessary renovations can be accomplished in just three or four days: The restaurant will close following service on Sunday and aim to reopen on Thursday. There’s no small list of things he’ll need to do, either; he plans to demolish the restaurant’s bar as well as a nearby counter with sinks. In place of the bar, he’ll erect a dividing wall that will direct traffic toward the right area to order, reports The Wichita Eagle.

A new counter will be built, and the ordering dynamic will, of course, change. No longer will a server approach a diner’s table and take their order. Instead, eaters will line up, share their phone number when they order, and receive a text when their food is ready to be picked up.

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In other words, diners will get their food “just like you would at Panera Bread,” Hensley told the Eagle. “We started brainstorming what we could do to try to make things a little bit better because right now, the way we’re operating, it’s just not sustainable. We have a high amount of cost and not enough volume of sales.”

One of the goals of the renovation is to appeal to a younger demographic, Hensley said, with the new design creating a more vibrant and high-energy environment. He suspects that, right now, there are young people in Wichita who believe a sit-down restaurant isn’t as efficient as they’d like it to be. He hopes the new format and ordering flow will change all of that.

“We need to increase sales, and I think a lot of people don’t come here because they see this as full service and think that it takes too long to get in and out,” he said. “And so we want to change that perspective and that paradigm.”

According to the Eagle, the restaurant will do away with rolled silverware and plates and instead serve food on tin platters. There will be a self-service beverage station where diners can fill their own drinks and grab napkins and silverware after ordering.

Avivo Brick Oven Pizzeria was originally opened in 2005, but has changed ownership twice since then. Hensley bought the pizzeria in 2021 with his daughter and son-in-law, both of whom are involved in day-to-day operations. The restaurant’s signature items have included an Old World Pepperoni Pizza, which is cut into 15 slices. The company menus an il Tricolore appetizer that is a nod to the Italian flag: Pesto, stracciatella and a homemade bruschetta mix are layered on a plate and served with pizza crust chips.

Hensley said the menu will shrink, but there will still be a handful of appetizers, salads and calzones. He told the Eagle they plan to add cannoli to the dessert menu, which already features a cheesecake. The restaurant will still serve alcohol, including canned and bottled beer, wine and cocktails.

One of the fears of pivoting to quick service, of course, is that it will alienate Avivo’s loyal diners who have grown accustomed to coming in, sitting down and being waited on. Hensley is conscious of that fact, but hopes they will still come out and support the pizzeria, and that any attrition they see will be off-set by the new traffic being pulled in.

“We want to keep all our existing customers. We love them,” he said. “We just need to start attracting other types of customers that haven’t been coming in and really spread the word about the type of environment that we have here.”