When local restaurateur Mike Connor rebranded his Broughton Street sports bar as a casual eatery named Satisfied last fall, he envisioned attracting the downtown business and legal crowd with high-quality food and exceptional customer service.
He succeeded, albeit too late.
Connor on Monday announced the restaurant’s pending closure. Satisfied will be open for lunch and dinner Friday and Saturday before closing its doors for good, ending a decade-long run for the eatery at the corner of Broughton and Jefferson streets.
“The first few months after the change were tough, but we had seen a turnaround since the first of the year,” Connor said. “We had all the right people eating in here. All the courthouse folks. All the locals who came downtown for the music festival. The hotels were sending guests our way.
“All the people I wanted to eat here our first 10 years and didn’t.”
Finances led to the decision, Connor said. He took on a minority partner, Steve Magulias of Toucan Café and Sweet Potatoes Kitchen, shortly after severing ties with Locos Grill and Pub, a restaurant chain based in Athens, last August.
Magulias helped Connor tweak his menu and improve the quality of Satisfied’s food and customer service. Magulias went “all in” after the first of the year, becoming a full partner, and the two planned to spend the spring establishing the restaurant’s reputation with an eye toward rebranding as Sweet Potatoes Kitchen in the fall.
Sales jumped 25 percent in 2013’s first quarter. But summer is traditionally the restaurant’s slowest time of the year, and “toughing it out until September” didn’t make sense financially, Connor said.
Plus, Magulias recently lost his chef at Toucan Café and has taken on that role himself.
“It was just a time-and-money deal. Neither is on our side right now, and you can’t hide from that,” Connor said. “And with Steve’s situation, his focus needs to be at Toucan. He wants to clear his head, lower his blood pressure and see where he stands.”
Connor did not rule out Sweet Potatoes Kitchen opening in Satisfied’s space in the future. He will appear before the Savannah Historic District Board of Review on May 8 seeking approval for a sign bearing the Sweet Potatoes Kitchen name. The decision to close the store was made two days before the submission deadline for the historic board’s May meeting, Connor said, and given the time-consuming nature of the historic board process, he decided to proceed with the petition anyway, “just in case.”
If approved, Connor would have a full year to begin work on the sign.
Connor will work for Magulias in the meantime, developing a franchise-ready concept for Sweet Potatoes. And the owner of the building that houses Satisfied is a childhood friend of Connor’s.
A letter signed by both Connor and Magulias states the restaurant might “reopen as Sweet Potatoes in late summer and early fall and, ideally, would love to do so in the same location if it were available.”
Connor’s restaurant enjoyed a long run, at least by Broughton Street standards. He and college pal Ben Everette opened the eatery as a Locos franchise in 2003, pouring $750,000 into renovations with the belief the overwhelming number of Georgia Bulldog fans in Savannah and the dearth of sports bars in town would translate to success.
They were right. The restaurant earned the 2004 Hospitality Small Business of the Year” award from the Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce.
Everette sold his share of the business in 2010 and Connor split with Loco’s last August. Connor closed the restaurant for several weeks to reconfigure the store. He created a private party room upstairs and reopened in early September.
Satisfied will be closed today, Wednesday and Thursday before opening for the two-day finale Friday and Saturday. Private parties booked through June 1 will be honored, and all outstanding gift cards are redeemable at Sweet Potatoes Kitchen and Toucan Café, Connor said.
“We want to do everything the right way to have the least impact on anybody,” Connor said.
SATISFIED
The eatery at 301 W. Broughton St. will close at the end of business Saturday. Private parties booked through June 1 will be honored, and all outstanding gift cards are redeemable at Sweet Potatoes Kitchen and Toucan Café.