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Yogi’s Closes After IU Buyout

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Yogi’s Grill & Bar will close its doors for the last time at the end of this month. The popular sports bar sold its lot to Indiana University last August, and had until August of next year to vacate their property. Yogi’s manager Patrick Cullen said the decision to close the business early was largely in deference to staff members.

“You know we were just at a good spot with our staffing where, you know, we have like five people who are leaving within a week of us closing anyways to move because they graduated last year and they’re getting regular jobs now,” Cullen said. “And so, do you staff up and run til graduation knowing that it’s not looking promising to finding a new home and then have to lay people off in the summer, or do you do it right now when we’re able to reach out to other people pretty quickly and get all of our staff that’s staying in town placed with other jobs?”

Cullen said the owners of Yogis were originally looking at relocating the 25 year old restaurant elsewhere in Bloomington, but high rental prices near the university forced them to fold.

“We’ve been looking for places and haven’t really been successful in any solid locations that make sense size-wise, rent-wise, that was a factor in one of the locations,” Cullen said, “but they wanted three times as much in rent than we would be able to afford.”

Indiana University spokespersons did not return phone calls by broadcast deadline, and so far the university has not commented on its plans or what it paid for the property at 519 East 10th street.

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