Growing local taco restaurant empire Tacolicious has permanently closed two of its locations, the owners say, due to the pandemic and the economic climate. The seven-year-old North Beach location and the Tacolicious at Santana Row in San Jose are no more.

Co-owner Sara Deseran tells the Mercury News that COVID was to blame, and the company is still maintaining its restaurants in the Mission, Marina, Palo Alto, and Manhattan Beach in Southern California.

"We have parklets and roofs and heaters and a lot of tequila," Deseran says. "We’ll see how the winter goes. Hoping for a stimulus package like all small businesses. It will be critical."

The Manhattan Beach location debuted earlier this year, just before the pandemic began, but Deseran says it is still doing okay.

Tacolicious opened a small downtown outpost on Market Street one year ago, called Tacolicious Chico, devoted specifically to tacos de guisados — tacos with braised meat fillings. That location has remained "temporarily" closed since March, and it has disappeared from the company website.

In addition to the Tacolicious locations, which began with Marina location a decade ago, Deseran and husband Joe Hargrave have also launched a takeout/delivery rotisserie chicken business called MF Chicken that's run out of the Tacolicious kitchens.

Sidebar: Governor Gavin Newsom dropped in to the Mission location for tacos on Election Day two weeks ago, and posed with a photo of Barack Obama eating tacos.