NEW YORK — "If you feed them, they will come," reads a sign inside Staten Island's Project Brunch restaurant.

The eatery, famous for its seven-day-a-week brunch menu featuring off-the-wall waffles and decadent drinks, has seen better days.

Forced to close a North Shore location because of the coronavirus pandemic, its South Shore location, the brand's first, is now also dangerously close to shutting down.

"It's just been really hard to keep our business open when we don't have much coming in," said Alexa Mazza's mother, who owns Project Brunch.

Once bustling with customers willing to wait two hours to eat, Project Brunch grew a cult-like following since it opened in 2016. Takeout and outdoor dining, and eventually some indoor dining, brought faith that the restaurant would make it.

Then came last week's “orange zone” designation because of the neighborhood's high rate of positive COVID-19 cases. The restaurant was forced to close indoor dining.

With no sense of when they'll be able to reopen, owners started a GoFundMe page in a last-ditch effort to stay alive.

"We're just all in this position where I don't know how long restaurants are going to be able to last without any relief, without opening up,” Mazza told NY1.

It's a similar story across the island, at Bin 5.

Opened in 2011 as fine dining for a neighborhood that hadn't seen such food concepts before, Bin 5 has tried to reinvent itself since March, testing out comfort food menus and offering takeout craft cocktails.

But this past weekend the eatery served just 12 Thanksgiving dinners compared to 120 last year, spurring owner Danny Ippolito to seek from a GoFundMe page as well.

"I don’t see how we can really pay the bills much longer with these systems in place," he told NY1.

Indoor dining restrictions, cold temperatures, and fears about contracting the virus are just some factors that have hurt restaurants throughout the city. Ippolito says he's heartbroken to think about closing.

“Without the individual personalities of Staten Island restaurants — without the opportunity to be creative — Staten Island is dark now,” he said. “The urgent care lines are long and the restaurant lines are short."

Bin 5's GoFundMe has already raised more than $11,000 since it began three days ago. Absent help from the federal government, or falling short of a $150,000 fundraising goal, Ippolito says he's not sure how much longer he will last.

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