This one stings just a little bit.

Starland Café, at one time maybe Savannah’s most popular go-to for lunch North of Victory Drive, is now closed. The announcement was made by owner Michael Pritchard via social media on Wednesday morning as part of an statement that they’d be closing for a bit for cleanup and renovations.

“The renovations have reached a pivotal point where we can no longer ensure the highest standards of safety and service with customers present.” Pritchard said.

One thing we can share that was somewhat stuck in between the lines of that announcement is that Starland Café as we knew it will not return.

“It will not be a re-incarnation” Michael told me earlier this week.

I had a great conversation with Michael on Monday, the kind I wish had been recorded for a podcast. The simple reason is because then Savannah could hear what I heard. I heard a man who loves this city. I heard a man who’d been struggling with the decision to pivot with the Cafe for the better part of a year, if not longer. Peeling away the emotion and getting down to the long and the short of it, the time had come to move the building he owns at 11 East 41st Street in a different direction.

25 years is an incredible run particularly when you consider Starland Café was only open for lunch, Monday through Friday. Most bean counters would wonder how that is even possible. It was possible because of how it all came to be.

Back in the mid 90’s (about 30 years ago if you are scoring at home) Michael was associated with a group that was looking to invest in the Starland neighborhood. Greg Jacobs and John Dederick were the visionaries who saw the potential in the area. They purchased nearly every house on East 41st Street, plus other property in the area. The plan was to renovate all and sell them. Michael says he was part of the plans because of his relationship with John.

They were most certainly pioneers in this city. I don’t think you need us to get into what that part of town looked like 3 decades ago.

The first ‘tenant’ in the space that later became Starland Café was a coffee shop, owned by Bull Street’s Gallery Espresso.

“Judy opened a rocket ship themed coffee shop called The Starlander.” Michael says. “But we knew pretty quickly that it was going to struggle. There was just no one around here.”

Hard to imagine no traffic of any kind in the Starland District, isn’t it? This pre-dates Back in the Day Bakery by many years. Michael and John witnessed it plenty.

“A year or so later, we came to terms with Judy.” Michael says “She walked away and left us a cafe with all of its equipment. It was turnkey.”

“People kept telling us we needed food. But we had to decide whether to do food or coffees because we couldn’t do both.”

They chose food, and Starland Café was born. John and Greg were handling properties, Michael was running the café.

From there, the whole “F&B thing” took off on them. Starland Café’s popularity in the early 2000’s led to a ton of catering opportunities. It wasn’t long before movie productions were calling on them to provide food service on their sets. For 15 years Starland’s Café’s catering arm was one of Savannah’s front row food service providers for the film industry. Business was booming.

“It was great money.” Michael admitted “But it’s really unforgiving. Oh, your mom died? We’re really sorry to hear that but we need meals tomorrow.”

Eventually, the money and the stress didn’t matter anymore. 15 years was long enough. Quality of life was more important.

That part of this story is important because all the while, Starland Café’s revenue really wasn’t a primary focus. No one is interested in losing money, of course, but how much Starland could make only doing lunch service 5 days a week wasn’t the most important line on the ledger. Through a lot of hard work, there was enough revenue elsewhere to make it all work.

Which brings us to 2025 and the decision to do something else.

Michael Pritchard is not the first restaurant owner in Savannah to decide they want to do something else with their time. He owns the building that houses Starland Cafê and the rental property upstairs, which affords him flexibility. There are other ventures he’s gotten involved in which, very frankly, excite him more than dealing with the issues that come with running a restaurant in Savannah, Georgia circa 2025. The energy required to run a restaurant in your 30’s is in much higher supply than it is in your 50’s and the need to dig deeper to find more is less and less appealing. Especially when you have other things going on.

Add to that, Michael admits that while Starland Café has remained very popular with locals, he’s hearing more and more complaints from regulars that parking is harder and harder to come by when they visit their favorite ‘off the beaten path’ lunch spot.

“No one wants to park a block or more away and walk here for lunch.” he says. Which doesn’t make the thought of rebuilding Starland’s ‘powerhouse’ status all that appealing. Not to mention the fact that the options for lunch in that part of town have gone through the roof. It’s a different time, everywhere.

Lease the space and let someone else do lunch there? He says there’s been lots of interest in taking it over, but his terms for a lease are pretty set in stone. It will be lunch only, five days a week. No beer and wine sales. He doesn’t want to disrupt the neighborhood. 28 seats inside and 28 outside aren’t enough to make those terms work. There have been no takers, and to a man, Michael is OK with that.

What he is most interested in is creating a space that is still community-centric. Art gallery? Perhaps. Small event space? That intrigues him too. Time will reveal all of that. The only certainty now is that he get on with the renovations and repairs that the building is in need of. This week has been dedicated to a lot of the clean up required to clear out a very popular restaurant at the end of a 25 year-run.

Michael wants Savannah to know that this decision wasn’t easy. As we mentioned, the hand wringing associated with it goes back over year. I’ve spoken to many restaurant owners over the years who have made the decision to close. This one was the most difficult. Twenty five years is a long time to do anything, more so something that offers you a connection to a community you care about so deeply.

He knows that connection won’t be exactly the same when he re-opens in whatever form that is, but he is hoping you will stop by and visit when he does.

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