COVID closes Boise cafe after it rolled the dice for a year. Owner has new game plan.

A few weeks after the pandemic began, Room and Boards Cafe co-owner Scott Pepper realized that the coronavirus doesn’t play fair.

Sure, the game library had nearly doubled to 750 titles, ranging from “Clue” and “Dungeons & Dragons” to “Everdell” and “Rap Godz.” But with social distancing in place, Room and Boards, 12598 W. Farview Ave., could fit only about a dozen customers inside.

“The unique part of the business,” Pepper explains in a phone interview, “was it was dependent on having large groups of people there for extended periods of time. That just isn’t conducive to COVID.”

So after one last game Saturday, he folded up the boards and picked up the pieces.

Room and Boards, which Pepper opened with his wife, Clara, in September 2019, has closed for good.

But it’s not game over entirely.

Room and Boards still offers a membership rental program. And soon, he plans to launch an online business: The Home Game. A subscription box service, it will ship titles to doorsteps nationwide. Pepper already has secured a new office space, he says. Room and Boards’ current rental members will be merged into the new concept.

“I love board games,” Pepper says. “If I can’t have people come to me to play board games, I can bring that to them.”

Want updates? Room and Boards Cafe’s Facebook page will be converted to The Home Game’s page, he says.

In the meantime, Pepper will have fond memories of serving sandwiches and beer to dice-throwing Boise customers on Saturday nights.

Before the coronavirus, he says, Room and Boards’ future looked bright. Weekend reservations were necessary at the 50-capacity cafe.

“We had all kinds of good plans to go places going forward,” Pepper says. “Friday through Sunday, we were just busy, busy busy.”

This story was originally published August 26, 2020 at 3:16 PM.