Wednesday, December 16, 2020

Bits & Bites

After months of delays of various kinds, Fire Hen is now open in Buckhead Village.  The restaurant, located at the corner of Cains Hills Place and Irby Avenue adjacent to Woody's CheeseSteaks, serves a variety of items including rotisserie chicken, vegetable and meat hand pies, as well as assorted sides and desserts.  

A new restaurant called Big Bang Katsu House is coming soon to Windward Parkway in Alpharetta.  The new eatery will open in a restaurant-heavy strip center at 5250 Windward Parkway adjacent to Home Depot and across the street from Costco.  Big Bang replaces Which Wich, the struggling sandwich franchise which closed in the space several months ago.   

Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant will open the first of two planned Atlanta area locations December 15 before the end of the year .  The Buckhead restaurant, which occupies about 7,800 square feet of the former Pirch/Filene's Basement/decor, features premiere Peachtree Road visibility facing Phipps Plaza.  A second Iron Hill is expected to open in 2021 in the street level of the new Twelve24 office tower along Hammond Drive in an outparcel of Perimeter Mall in Dunwoody.  

Nitrolicious Ice Cream in Buckhead has closed.  The wannabe trendy ice cream shop replaced what had been several Planet Smoothie iterations in The Peach shopping center on Peachtree Road.  The local shop opened last fall and closed permanently within the past couple of weeks. The 1,200 square foot space is currently being marketed for lease.

Coastal States Bank will open soon in Sandy Springs.  The Hilton Head Island, South Carolina-based bank will open at 6160 Roswell Road, which was most recently home to Starbucks before the mega coffee shop relocated to a custom building on the site of the old American Pie a few blocks south.  The 3,749 square foot building was built in 1960 and first operated as First Federal Savings.  A nearly identical building was located on Piedmont Avenue in Piedmont Heights, and is currently a Starbucks after the coffee chain butchered the Mid Century Modern building to better suit their needs.  The Sandy Springs location of Coastal States will provide the bank with both a traditional branch as well as regional office space above the branch that had gone under-utilized in its days as Starbucks.  Coastal States currently has only a handful of Atlanta area locations in total, including one in Cumming and another in Dawsonville.  We at ToNeTo Atlanta are thrilled to see the bank make use of the building rather than demolish it as we feared might happen.   

Painted Tree Marketplace will open its second Atlanta area location next year in Roswell.  The new store, coming to Sandy Plains Village at the corner of Sandy Plains and Woodstock Road, will open in the former Walmart Neighborhood Market/Kroger, where there was talk last year that Ignite Adventure Park would open. (In June, center owner SITE Centers sought to have the former grocery box and adjacent parcels rezoned for a townhome development.)  Painted Tree Marketplace is similar to intown multi-vendor stores Kudzu Antiques and Westside Market, but with an emphasis on new products.  The first Painted Tree opened in Little Rock, Arkansas in 2015, and the chain has since grown to ten stores with another four more coming soon, according to the company website.  The company entered the Atlanta market late last year when they opened in a former DSW/ Stein Mart in Buford's Marketplace at Millcreek.  The store opened December 19, 2019, then closed March 23 amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and local restrictions, and reopened May 15.  At 60,000 square feet, the Roswell location will be twice the size of the Buford store.  In boilerplate verbiage that seems unlikely to be currently accurate, Painted Tree claims  "Thousands of shoppers looking for home decor, fashion, and more come to this market every day!"  "Painted Tree is aiming for 10 to 12 new store openings per year. Store sizes will range from 30,000 to 50,000 square feet, with a typical footprint of 35,000 square feet," according to an October press release announcing the company's upcoming expansion.  

AutoZone will soon open a new location in the former Eckerd/RiteAid at 2200 Roswell Road near the Pavilions at East Lake shopping center in East Cobb.  

Just Love Coffee Cafe opened Monday December 7 at The Shops at Arabelle Perimeter at the corner of Hammond Drive and Peachtree Dunwoody Road in Sandy Springs.  The roughly 2,000 square foot breakfast and lunch eatery is situated adjacent to ToNeTo Atlanta favorite The Local Expedition in the street level retail of the apartment complex first known as Hanover Perimeter.  ToNeTo Atlanta first reported on the Sandy Springs opening of the Brentwood, Tennessee-based franchise February 12.  

A new location of Five Below is coming soon to Stone Mountain Square in Stone Mountain.  The nearly 9,000 square foot store is expected to open February 12, 2021, according to signage at the center.  

A new location of Team Rehabilitation will open in January along LaVista Road in Oak Grove.  The new physical therapy clinic will open in Vista Grove Plaza in a 4,400 square foot space most recently home to The Vista Room, a special events venue operated by the owners of neighboring Napoleon's Grille.  The Vista Room closed in March, while Napoleon's, which was also slated to close, has remained open.   Team Rehab's Oak Grove clinic, which will specialize in outpatient PT needs for all ages, is being opened by Clinic Director and nearby resident Daniel Bernath, PT,DPT,OCS, who joins Team Rehab after five years with BenchMark Physical Therapy.

FORD'S BBQ finally opened Thursday December 3 on Main Street in downtown Tucker.  The eatery, which ToNeTo Atlanta first announced April 30, 2019, is located at 2337 Main Street, and according to locals, was well worth the wait!  

Locally owned outdoor goods and apparel retail DAS Outfitters is closing in Chamblee at the end of the year.  The roughly 4,300 square foot store, located in the Whole Foods Market-anchored Peachtree Station shopping center, first opened in October 2017.  The store is currently liquidating all in-stock merchandise with savings of 20-90% off retail prices. The closure of DAS marks the second locally owned retailer to close in the center in just the past few months.  The Cook's Warehouse closed its store in the center over the summer after opening in August 2017.    

Supercuts has closed its studio and training center at Toco Hills shopping center. The corporately-owned location had been a Toco Hills mainstay for more than 20 years.  

Urban Wok plans to open Monday December 21 28 at TOWN Brookhaven.  ToNeTo Atlanta first reported on the planned opening of the new stir-fry franchise September 5.  The nearly 1,300 square foot Brookhaven outpost replaces Olive Bistro, which closed in late 2017.  Local franchisee Artimus Hart plans to open a total of four locations in metro Atlanta in the coming years.   

Several local BB&T and SunTrust branches have closed in recent days in wake of the consolidation of the networks following their merger and rebranding as Truist.  The SunTrust branch on Roswell Road near Powers Ferry Road have has closed.  Several others, including the SunTrust branch in Sage Hill shopping center on Briarcliff Road, SunTrust on North Druid Hills Road at I-85 and the BB&T at City Center Crossing on Roswell Road in Sandy Springs, are closing soon. 

GAP is closing its store at Atlantic Station in Atlanta.  The store, which opened with the mixed-use center in 2005, is actively liquidating with all in-stock merchandise at 30-50% off.  The sale is expected to continue through the end of January or until all merchandise is sold.  GAP is the latest in a string of "typical mall retailers" that have closed in the project including American Eagle and Kay Jewelers.  Sibling GAP brand Banana Republic remains open at Atlantic Station.

Bed Bath & Beyond revealed Monday that it plans to sell its Cost Plus World Market division to focus on its core business.  The home-goods retailer will sell Cost Plus to Los Angeles-based private equity firm, Kingswood Capital Management.  The sale includes the brand’s 243 brick-and-mortar locations, e-commerce business, two distribution facilities and corporate office in Alameda, California.  Union, New Jersey-based Bed Bath & Beyond spent $495 million to purchase Cost Plus in 2012.  Bed Bath & Beyond did not disclose terms of the sale.  Cost Plus has several locations in metro Atlanta including those in Buckhead, Buford, Dunwoody, Smyrna and Kennesaw, among others.  

Great American Cookies and Marble Slab Creamery will open a co-branded storefront at Parkside West Cobb on Dallas Highway in West Cobb.   The new, roughly 1,400 square foot shop, will open in the former Peace of Popcorn which closed in the development this past February.  The new cookie and ice cream shop will sport the two businesses' new logos which, as we reported in September, appear to have been created by a child.  

KBBQ on Fire in Alpharetta has closed.   The Korean barbecue restaurant opened in the location that was formerly a Burger 21 on Old Milton Parkway in Alpharetta earlier this year.  There was reportedly no advance warning of the closure, but signs on the window indicate the restaurant is permanently closed.     

E.M. Bop, another restaurant specializing in Korean BBQ, has closed its Alpharetta restaurant at 800 Main Street.  According to a ToNeTo Atlanta reader, the popular Alpharetta eatery closed in recent weeks, but remains open on Pleasant Hill Road in Duluth. 

Popular Roswell restaurant Foundation Social Eatery announced Saturday that it will be closing for good at the end of the year.  "It’s with heavy hearts we must announce that we’re closing our doors at the end of the month. Our last dinner service will be December 31, 2020 — New Year’s Eve."  The New American eatery was opened by chef Mel Toldeo, a veteran of local restaurants Bacchanalia and Posh.    "To those not in the know, we have been searching for a new and better location for the last couple of years. Our lease officially expired in March 2020, and we’ve been continually extending it by a few months at a time while we continued our search for a new location. A week ago, our landlord informed us they had found another tenant to take on a long term lease and gave us our 45 day notice to vacate." The Facebook message continued.  Toledo opened Foundation Social Eatery in early 2014.   

Chicken Salad Chick opened its newest Atlanta area location December 8 on Highway 124 (Scenic Highway) in Snellville.   The new outpost, which ToNeTo Atlanta first reported on August 5, occupies a former Wendy's and features an ever-more important drive-thru.  The Auburn, Alabama-based chain now has 15 locations in metro Atlanta and a total of 32 locations in the state, making Georgia their largest market across their 17 state footprint. 

Modular furniture retailer Lovesac plans to open a pair of new Atlanta area locations in coming weeks.  The new locations, which will bring the company to three in the market, are coming to The Avenue East Cobb in East Cobb and The Avenue Peachtree City in Peachtree City.  The company's current Atlanta area location is at Lenox Square in Buckhead but it previously operated stores at North Point Mall in Alpharetta and Mall of Georgia in Buford, among others.   The Stamford, Connecticut-based company was started by entrepreneur Shawn Nelson in 1995 and is "having a moment," some might say, with more consumers working from home and looking for flexible furniture.  The company last week reported better than expected sales and a surprise profit, sending its stock price up even higher.  In the months since its March low of $4, Lovesac stock, NASDAQ: LOVE, is up approximately 900 per cent and now trades at about $40 per share.

Two local business founders died in recent weeks.  Arden Zinn, founder of popular juice and smoothie company Arden's Garden died November 23 due to COVID-19 and Parkinson's. Zinn was 83.  Jean Mori, co-founder of Mori Luggage & Gifts, died December 1, five days shy of what would have been his 84th birthday.  "A brief cancer illness" was cited as the cause of Mori's death. 

4 comments:

J Leeds said...

E.M. Bop is the best Korean BBQ I’ve found. Too bad that the Alpharettta location is gone.

Jml813 said...

I know. We enjoyed them also!

I hadn't had a chance to try the rebranded bbq former burger place on Old Milton but never saw anybody in there.

Anonymous said...

It is such a shame that Atlantans don't support small businesses like DAS and Cook's Warehouse. This is a chain city to the core.

Anonymous said...

Foundation Social Eatery is relocating to closer intown, buckhead area

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