Soulshine Pizza Factory Closed in Midtown [Updated]

Soulshine Pizza Factory in Midtown is closed for business and will not reopen — as a Soulshine location, at least. Along with other area businesses, the restaurant and live music venue faced noise complaints from tenants of neighboring condos that reached a fever pitch in the fall of 2016 and spring of 2017. Don Clifford, who joined the company as CEO in January 2017, tells the Scene that while the Midtown location has not received another noise complaint or citation since enclosing its patio in early 2017, business still suffered.

"It was not doing what we wanted it to do in sales," Clifford says, speaking via phone. "It never really recovered with the patio being enclosed, and so we just want to look at something different — different areas." 

The company, a regional chain whose restaurants serve pizza, sandwiches and beer in Oxford, Flowood and Ridgeland, Miss., as well as Franklin, Tenn., plans to try something different in the space at 1907 Division St., though there are no concrete arrangements in place. Clifford sees the character of the neighborhood changing, with somewhat upscale establishments like the nearby Hopsmith Tavern and Caviar & Bananas taking off, and he says the space at the very least needs a facelift to compete, citing five years of wear and tear since Soulshine moved into the building in 2012. 

Clifford declined to discuss specific ideas for the space, though he did say there are some potential partnerships on the table. Soulshine founder Chris Sartin, who is also a musician, remains with the company, and they haven't ruled out including live music as part of whatever establishment they open in the building.

“That’s why people come to Nashville,” Clifford says with a laugh. “We look downtown and we see how much business is there. We look around the Midtown area and some of the folks are doing music there, they’re doing well. We’re just trying to decide what we want to do with it.” 

Update Feb. 13, 10:30 a.m.: Soulshine's Chris Sartin tells the Scene that the live music events that were booked at Soulshine in Midtown are being migrated over to Corner Pub in the Nations at 1105 51st Ave. N. Soulshine's popular Sunday Jam, which celebrated 250 sessions on Feb. 11, will be the first to return, followed by music events on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.