California Pizza Kitchen (CPK) will this weekend permanently close its restaurant in Peachtree Corners. The restaurant, located in The Forum (5173 Peachtree Parkway) is due to close at 6 PM, Sunday March 31, according to a restaurant employee. The roughly 5,500 square foot restaurant first opened in May 2009.
The company blamed the the East Cobb and Dunwoody closures on the pandemic and "related lease challenges with our landlords." There was no explanation provided for the Peachtree Corners closure but we are told that Forum owner North American Properties is actively working on a replacement restaurant.
The Forum, which was acquired by North American Properties in 2022, is expected to welcome several new eateries in the near future including first-to-market locations of Cookie Fix, a Birmingham-based cookie franchise and Nando's PERi PERi, a South African chicken restaurant. The development, which is currently under renovation, is also expected in the months to come, to welcome a new location of Politan Row, the popular food hall with Atlanta area locations in Midtown (Colony Square) and Dunwoody (Ashford Lane).
CPK's closure in Peachtree Corners also marks the third restaurant to close in the area in recent weeks following the closures of Capital Tacos and Corner Bakery.
Following the closures, CPK will operate three restaurants in metro Atlanta: Lenox Square in Buckhead, near North Point Mall in Alpharetta, and at Atlantic Station in Atlanta.
Are you a fan of California Pizza Kitchen? What is your favorite Peachtree Corners area restaurant? What kind of restaurant would you most like to see open in Peachtree Corners?
Please share your thoughts below.
6 comments:
It seems as if The Forum has been on a slow downward slide the last few years. Every time I visit, I find fewer reasons to go back. I realize often the Managment Company has no control, but to let locations like Williams Sonoma and California Pizza close is not moving in the right direction.
I used to love The Forum but like the above poster said there are not a lot of reasons to go anymore. I see why they have to renovate it since there are really not enough national retail stores to keep it going in its current form. I hope I like it once the construction is done but I'm afraid the changes will bring less parking and possibly hard to navigate parking decks.
The service at this location has gone downhill since the pandemic. Our family stopped going months ago because the service issues were so frustrating.
Regarding the Forum, it is now owned by North American Properties who have a very good track record, including turning around Atlantic Station and launching Avalon. CPK is not the type of dining brand they would traditionally want in their centers anyway, so expect them to recruit more locally owned restaurants from intown Atlanta.
"turning around Atlantic Station" You're kidding, right? Atlantic Station is the worst. Companies like NAP and Hines keep pouring money into AS and the area and nothing happens. There are a ton of empty stores, T3 is only 35% leased, including half a floor being leased by Hines to Hines. Nothing will save that area and yet they still add new Atlantic Station neon-esque signs that are confusing and distracting during the day time.
California Pizza Kitchen was once an iconic restaurant brand where flavors and ingredients collided on pizzas like never seen before. Who can forget the first time that you detoured from the traditional pepperoni and sausage pizza and instead ordered the unique BBQ Chicken Pizza and never looked back at “normal” pizza toppings. However, over a period of years when the brand was owned by private equity, the brand’s shine became to dim. Sustaining and growing brands requires continued investment in the system, which isn’t a strength or the intention of most PE firms - especially those that don’t specialize in restaurant ownership and operations. Golden Gate Capital, once the owner of CPK, Red Lobster and Bob Evans is a prime example of allowing iconic brands to diminish due to non-investment in their core infrastructures.
We can only hope that Focus Brands or Inspire Brands (Rourk Capital) or possibly Darden will rescue CPK and add the shine back to this once iconic California inspired brand. I will miss my visits to the CPK At Forum, as I did my visits to the Dunwoody location.
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