A combination cocktail bar and dive bar business is slated to open by year’s end in the Midtown-area building last home to Cafe Coco.
Beau Gaultier will own and operate cocktail bar Verna in the building’s front space and Connie’s Upscale Dive in the back space, which once accommodated live music and stand-up comedy. Gaultier will be joined as an owner by Connor Bloem and chef Daniel Gorman (who will also have some ownership in the business).
Gaultier, Bloem and Gorman will operate the business via Verna Hospitality, a recently formed entity. The team has been working on the space since February.
The address of the building, which features multiple businesses on its second level, is 210 Louise Ave.
Gaultier owns izakaya-centric cocktail bar Bay 6, which opened in April 2022 at The Wash, joined in ownership of the business by Tyler Cable (who also owns The Wash property).
Cafe Coco — a Midtown institution of sorts popular with Vanderbilt students, health care workers and random bohemians and hipsters — will clos…
Gaultier says Verna is expected to be operational from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. daily. The menu will feature “Cajun comfort food,” Japanese-influenced fare and standard cafe items. The beverage menu, as noted, will be cocktail-focused. Connie’s menu, in contrast, will offer hot dogs, with the beverage lineup to be more beer- and shot-focused.
Gaultier says the ownership team — which is handling the bulk of the updates to the building’s front and back spaces — expects to employ 15 to 20 full- and part-time individuals.
Verna will offer layout, art, decor, etc., similar to that of Cafe Coco, which was owned and operated for years by Chuck Cinelli before he sold the business in 2020 to a Washington couple.
“We retained as much of the original vibe as possible,” Gaultier, originally from Louisiana, says of the Cafe Coco space.
Verna Hospitality is not disclosing the cost to get operational or terms of the lease with the owners of the property.
Cafe Coco closed following Thanksgiving 2023.
This article was first published by our sister publication, the Nashville Post.
