Leesburg apparently is a great place to start a restaurant. 

Restaurants which start here seem to frequently clone in second locations. Vintage 50 and Blue Ridge Grill have launched sister stores in Broadlands. The Cajun Experience is expanding to Georgetown and some years ago, Tuskie's created Magnolia's in Purcellville.

The Leesburg Department of Economic Development has taken note and is striving to help more restaurants be successful by creating a comphensive directory for them, no small undertaking considering as they currently list over 110 restaurants. There is no shortage of space to bring in more, and if you take space in the historic district, no expensive tap fee either.

The directory will link you to Google Maps to help you locate them. (Google Maps would encourage all business owners to enroll in Google Places, where a business owner can create a valuable listing about the business, including a direct link to a website, business description and hours and the ability to upload images.  For a restauranteur, this a great place to show off photos of entrees and other dishes)

They have also created a directory listing our eight hotels and inns, which between them have nearly 600 rooms. Even at that we probably could use some more hotels, I've heard that rooms can be hard to come by on weekends during wedding season.

Why has the Town taken this project on?  Aren't other groups doing this already?

Well, take a moment and Google "Leesburg Restaurants" and see what results. Seven of Leesburg's top restaurants are shown on the Google map, but if you scroll down and check some of the so-called directories, you'll not find one that approaches the thoroughness of the new Town authored directory.

Leesburg has no dedicated group that approaches the scope of either the Loudoun Convention & Visitors Association or the Loudoun Chamber of Commerce. Both of those organizations do great work, but are not responsible for creating a focus on business and tourism within the Leesburg town limits.

So kudos to the Leesburg Department of Economic Development. It's going to be quite a task keeping up with all the restaurant comings and goings, but this directory is going to be very helpful in seeing that the "coming" side of the scale greatly outweighs the "going" side.

You can link to restaurant directory from the blue sidebar.