by J. Brooks Terry
Staff Writer
When the doors of The Southend Brewery & Smokehouse open at the end of the month, the only thing its patrons may recognize is the owners and the location.
Southend, which is co-owned by Kerry Williams and Garrett Luebker, closed in July for what was supposed to be two months worth of renovations. The reopening may be later than expected, but the restaurant will open with a new look and name. The Jacksonville Landing restaurant will now be known as Copper Cellar Grille & Brewery and focus on a higher-end clientele and wine aficionados.
A soft opening will coincide with the annual Florida-Georgia college football game on Oct. 29.
“You’re not going to recognize it,” Landing spokesperson Rachel Kaltenbach said. “They’ve completely changed everything from the floors to the walls.
“Aside from the brewery, they went ahead and redid the entire restaurant.”
The menu, Kaltenbach said, is still being planned as is the future of the restaurant’s upstairs private meeting room.
“A lot of the details are still being kept tight under wraps until the owners are ready to release them to the public,” she said. “But I know they’ve hired a marketing director and, before long, they’ll launch a campaign to let everyone know what else they have planned.”
Williams and Luebker purchased the Southend Brewery concept in September 2004 from North Carolina-based limited partnership Ventures, LP, just months before the Feb. 6 Super Bowl.
Minor menu and staffing tweaks were made when the restaurant changed hands, though the bulk of the Southend concept was left unchanged until early August when work to overhaul the restaurant began.
At that time, Williams and Luebker declined interviews with regards to what was in store for the waterfront brewery as did Landing management.
A formal announcement was expected later that month, but never came.
“We have been working on the new plans for so many months,” Williams said at the time. “We took our time researching and analyzing what would work best with the space that we have and really listen to what the people of Jacksonville were looking for.”
The restaurant will close shortly after the end of the month soft opening to allow for minor tweaks. A grand opening will be held just before the holiday season.