The
TGI Friday'slocation in a high-profile spot at the corner of West End and 21st Avenue has shut its doors. The closure occurred last week and today the building appears stripped and forlorn; all the TGI Friday's signage has been removed and even the familiar red-and-white striped awning is gone.
Signs posted on doors say, "This location is closed. Sorry for any inconvenience," along with urging diners to visit other TGI Friday's outposts in Opry Mills, Madison, Cool Springs and Murfreesboro's Stones River Mall.
The TGI Friday's on West End opened in 2007, successor to a pioneering TGIF a few blocks away on Elliston Place. (It's hard to imagine amid our current vogue for chef-driven independent restaurants and epicurean cocktails, but in the 1970s and early '80s, the Friday's on Elliston was the hip place to hang out, a stone's throw from Exit/In and other Rock Block fixtures.)
It's unclear what caused the West End store's demise, but plenty of wiseacres of Bites' acquaintance are jokingly speculating that the chain's current "endless appetizer" promotion had somehow run amok.
