Señor Frog’s closed its Waikiki restaurant Sunday and will lay off 82 workers.

The Mexican restaurant with three bars said it couldn’t work out a new lease agreement for its third-floor space at the Royal Hawaiian Center at the corner of Kalakaua Avenue and Lewers Street.

La Rana Hawaii LLC, dba Señor Frog’s, "tried to negotiate with its landlord over its current lease, but was unsuccessful," Salvador Carpinteyro, general manager, wrote in a plant-closing notice to the state Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. "The landlord has asked that Señor Frog’s vacate the restaurant’s premises by Aug. 20."

Company employees will be laid off as of Aug. 20, the notice said.

The 14,000-square-foot restaurant and nightclub opened its only Hawaii restaurant in the then newly renovated Royal Hawaiian Center in 2007.

Carpinteyro, the general manager, said he didn’t know whether the restaurant would open in another location here.

"We have no more comments about it. It’s actually a corporate decision," Carpinteyro said Monday.

Royal Hawaiian Center said in a statement it "looks forward to announcing new restaurants that will be joining its exceptional array of dining options."

Señor Frog’s operates between 15 and 19 locations in Mexico, the United States and the Caribbean, the company’s website said. The company touted itself as a fun, family-oriented restaurant during the day and early evening and a party spot late at night.

Nicole Niau, a former cocktail server who started at Señor Frog’s when it opened in 2007, said the business got off to a rough start from the beginning because it was not suited for the high-end shopping complex.

"They just were way over their head. Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center is way too expensive for that kind of place," Niau said. "I think that their rent was too high, and there weren’t enough customers to go and fill the bars in there. That’s why their business went down, because they didn’t have enough business coming in."

Honolulu retail analyst Stephany Sofos said the business, which has a large following in collegiate areas on the mainland, was never able to get the menu right.

"It’s really a fun experience. The booze was good but the food was horrible," she said. "People complained for years about the food, and they didn’t do anything about it. In the beginning they had lines coming out the door because their international reputation brought people to them. However, because of the recession and because people have complained about the quality of food, it goes around quickly, and that can kill a business."