Cookeville News, Toot's restaurant is closing. (Murfreesboro, Smyrna: university, prices, move to)

[2mares]

I never ate at Toots and didnt realize it was a chain. I have noticed many small restaruants in Cookeville closing. Recently, Europa, Taste of Home, Big Foots, and the lazy donkey on 10th never even got to the grand opening. I imaging its partially due to the competition from large chains and partially mismanagement.

[Lucky Eddy]

Dukes is also closed and for sale, and after eating once at the East Side Cafe, the last two times we have been to Cookeville it has been closed too, once on a Friday and the last time on a Wednesday.

[JMT]

Originally Posted by Lucky Eddy

Dukes is also closed and for sale, and after eating once at the East Side Cafe, the last two times we have been to Cookeville it has been closed too, once on a Friday and the last time on a Wednesday.

That's really sad about East Side Cafe. It had closed many years ago but new owners resuscitated it a few years ago. It had pretty limited operating hours, I think they were open only for breakfast and lunch and never on weekends. It's too bad they couldn't hang in there. I think it's sad that people prefer chain restaurants over mom-and-pop places. Then again, maybe East Side wasn't as good as it used to be.

[2mares]

I think it's sad that people prefer chain restaurants over mom-and-pop places.

Thats one of those negative aspects of "progress". Pretty soon every town/city looks the same. Same restaraunts, same stores. All those unique mom an pop places cant compete.

[gent3278]

Does anybody know who owns the East Side Cafe (or can give me some idea how I can locate either the property owner or business owner). My wife and I own a nice cafe in Indiana and we are looking for a breakfast, lunch and dinner place to open in Cookeville. We have a house in Cookeville and have eaten at the East Side Cafe several times. If you can give me any information on this or other possible locations it would be greatly appreciated. I called phone number listed and it had been disconnected so I am sure it is no longer in business

[JMT]

Originally Posted by gent3278

Does anybody know who owns the East Side Cafe (or can give me some idea how I can locate either the property owner or business owner). My wife and I own a nice cafe in Indiana and we are looking for a breakfast, lunch and dinner place to open in Cookeville. We have a house in Cookeville and have eaten at the East Side Cafe several times. If you can give me any information on this or other possible locations it would be greatly appreciated. I called phone number listed and it had been disconnected so I am sure it is no longer in business

I did a property search at the assessor of property's web site. The owner of the property is listed ROBERSON PARTNERSHIP L P. I'll PM you the contact information.

Other neat information I found:
It's got a total market value of $193,200.
The property tax assessment is $77,280.
The building is 3,075 square feet.

I really think a good breakfast and lunch cafe would do well in that location. It's right off the square which has hundreds of government employees and lawyers' offices. I don't know why East Side Cafe didn't make it.

Good luck!

[cncguy2000]

I liked going to toot's.
Good chicken strips and $.99 draft.

they were busy everytime we ate there.

[Lucky Eddy]

We'll usually drive out of our way to eat at mom-and-pop places. Dipsy Doodle I thought was pretty far out but we ate there at least 5 times during our trips to Cookeville in Oct and Nov totaling 12 days. I don't think we ate at any of the big chain restaurants, unless ice cream at DQ counts. And we did get a Subway sandwich at the one in the Walmart at Algood, but that was after we found that Dukes was closed. gent3278, good luck with your quest. You might check out the Dukes location, it has a for sale sign out. I don't know the traffic flow, but it seemed to have a lot when we were in the area. Be sure to let everyone here know if you open a place, and we'll have a "reunion " there.

[marmac]

with post after post after post from people wanting to move to Cookeville ( or already have moved to Cookeville) it was a surprise to read about any restaurant or cafe closing down.

I thought they all would be packed and new ones going up at a rapid pace.

[carolmcb]

Was this part of the same Toot's chain that advertises itself as "good food and fun". They used to have TV ads running all the time. If it is, they are right on top of changing their website to reflect only 4 locations: Murfreesboro; Bowling Green; Cincinnati; and Smyrna.