Sabrina Marble works the dining room at the City Cafe in downtown Chattanooga. She has worked at the eatery on Carter Street for 11 years.City Cafe is expanding outside of Chattanooga with plans to soon open a diner in an abandoned Chinese and Japanese restaurant in Cleveland, Tenn.
The owners of City Cafe purchased the former Yummy restaurant at 919 NW Old 25th St. in Cleveland and have begun renovating the facility to open as the third City Cafe outlet.
“We’re completely remodeling the inside with new equipment and fixtures and we’re doing some cosmetic work outside so that we can open perhaps in late March or sometime in April,” said Gary Haworth, general manager of City Cafe. “We’ve been looking to expand either into Knoxville or Nashville and this is a nice progressive step in our expansion plans.”
Owned by Lee Epstein, City Cafe first opened in 2002 at M.L. King Boulevard and Carter Street downtown next to the Days Inn Rivergate hotel. The restaurant added a second location six years ago on Old Lee Highway next to a Best Western hotel.
The City Cafes operate as 24-hour-a-day diners, serving breakfasts at any time of the day. The typical restaurant employs about 40 full- and part-time employees, Haworth said.
“We’re always open so we like this Cleveland site because of its proximity to the university,” he said.
City Cafe will be the only diner of its type in Cleveland open around the clock when it opens this spring. Haworth said the restaurant chain also is looking at other sites for expansion in Tennessee.
“The more you have, the more you’re worth,” Haworth said.