Middle Georgia’s biggest city has a tight-knit restaurant community and a constant influx of diners, with more exciting plans to come.
By Haley Harward
Over the past decade, the hospitality industry in Macon has seen steady and continuous growth. Despite the pandemic-induced shutdown and resulting setbacks for restaurateurs, the industry continues to increase its employment numbers and welcome new restaurants.
As the birthplace and home of legends like Otis Redding, Little Richard and the Allman Brothers Band, the city is perhaps best known for its impact on the music world, and nearby Mercer University provides a constant influx and influence of college students to downtown restaurants, concert venues and stores.
New apartments have sprouted up intown, and the historic neighborhoods surrounding the downtown area have seen significant reinvestment and revitalization. With several initiatives and new projects, such as the Second Street Corridor Connect open in 2020 and a $100-million Macon Mall revitalization project in the works, it’s clear Macon has more on the table to come.
Tight-Knit Community
Macon’s restaurant scene includes iconic restaurants like H&H Soul Food, which opened in 1959, and the Rookery, both now operated by local restaurant company Moonhanger Group. There’s also S&S Cafeterias and Nu Way Weiners, the first location of which opened in downtown Macon in 1916. Newer restaurants include Kudzu Seafood Company, Brasserie Circa and Kinjo Kitchen + Cocktails.
But what’s at the heart of Macon’s restaurant renaissance? A tight-knit community intent on revitalizing the city and supporting one another.
Yash Patel is the owner of Macon’s oldest brewery, Macon Beer Company, which has a location on Oglethorpe Street in an industrial area of Macon. Patel noticed more prominent beer companies buying out local brands and pushing craft beer into a more macro setting, so he sought to expand Macon Beer Company’s footprint to another location in a similar fashion. The location on Second Avenue, which opened in 2019, has a kitchen, allowing the brewery to offer a full menu.
The new location not only provided the company an opportunity to take more control over branding, service and deliverability, it also breathed new life into one of downtown Macon’s historic buildings.
Working closely with the Historic Macon Foundation to uphold restoration rules and regulations and maintain the building’s integrity, Macon Brewing Company’s second location successfully launched in the former Independent Laundry Co., a building that’s more than 100 years.
“Were there learning curves? Of course,” Patel says. “That was a very interesting process – how to retrofit a building where we have so many restrictions [concerning] preservation. We didn’t want to completely gut it and lose all of the character because that defeats the purpose.”
Patel’s brewpub is not the only one of its kind expanding in the Macon area. In fact, the Macon beer scene has exploded since Macon Beer Company first opened in 2015. With additions like Fall Line Brewing Co., Ocmulgee Brewpub, Just Tap’d and Piedmont Brewery and Kitchen, the middle-Georgia city is quickly emerging as a beer destination.
Despite the recent influx of breweries and potential conflicts of interest for similar concepts, Patel says the restaurant community remains close and supportive.
“We’re all friends and colleagues, and we’re all doing the same thing, which is elevating the food and drinking scene in Macon,” Patel says. “From the general ways of like ‘hey, I’m short on my to-go boxes’ or ‘can you spot me a couple of pounds of beef,’ we’re not seeing that as a disadvantage [but] as an opportunity to grow our bond and help each other out even more.”
City Support
Tina Dickson, the owner of the first independent pizza shop in Macon, Ingleside Village Pizza, shares Patel’s sentiments and welcomes the new businesses with open arms. Ingleside Village Pizza opened in 1993 and features hand-tossed pizza made with dough made daily at the restaurant. It’s considered a local institution.
“When we first opened, we were pretty much in the heart of the city downtown at a time [when] nobody was going downtown because it was a terrible place to be. And now that’s the spot you should be,” she says. “I think the more restaurants the better.”
As a board member for Visit Macon and a restaurateur in operation for nearly 30 years, Dickson is enmeshed in the community. She participates in initiatives that bolster Macon’s restaurants and support regional growth, including Macon Beer Fest and Macon Shirts for Good, a custom T-shirt campaign started by a Mercer University staff member to support local businesses during the height of the pandemic.
Dickson’s restaurant is also one of 15 locations involved in a Visit Macon tourism initiative called Macon Memories Photo Spots and Instagram Moments. Launched in 2019, the initiative features iconic places throughout the city that locals and visitors alike can seek out for a great photo backdrop.
“It’s just something they came up with [to] be a good place to stand and take a photo,” says Dickson. “It’s like a photo hotspot. I have one of them at my restaurant in front of my mural.”
Funded by the Downtown Challenge Grant Program, The Peyton Anderson Foundation and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Visit Macon launched the project to attract tourists and bring awareness to the business or organization behind them by making them must-visit photoshoot locations.
Patel also works closely with Visit Macon as well as NewTown Macon, a non-profit community organization providing support to local businesses.
“Visit Macon just did the Macon Burger week, which we just won for the second year in a row,” he says. “NewTown Macon is a tremendous organization that helps all businesses, so we work on many things with them.”
Looking ahead, the city will see more independently owned and franchised eateries opening in the next few years, plus a job market that’s predicted to continuously climb over the next decade.
Thanks in part to the support from organizations like Visit Macon and NewTown Macon, along with the overwhelming support of local restaurateurs like Dickson and Patel, Macon’s restaurant scene is quickly becoming another reason to visit the city.