MOVING TIME: Whakatane restaurant Soulsa is shifting to the former Soul Organics location on Richardson Street. Photo Louis Klaassen
SOULSA restaurant owners Jono and Stacey Marr are moving to a new location on Richardson Street to provide a different dining experience for customers and enable them to host special functions.
Mr Marr said space at the current location on The Strand limited options.
“It’s so I can do functions and weddings. I’ve turned away quite a few this year because it’s too small in here,” he said.
He also had an issue with the acoustics of the old location.
“We want somewhere we can do live music; we can’t do that in here,” he said.
The restaurant will move into the former Soul Organics building in Richardson Street.
Mr Marr said though it would be possible to put in more tables and have a larger dinner service at the new location, that would not reflect his personal philosophy about what his customers’ experience should be.
“For me it’s not about turning over tables, it’s about keeping bums in seats and making sure they have a really good night so they want to come back,” he said.
He said he also liked the idea of the new location being off the main road because he wanted to offer his clients an out-of-the-way and intimate experience.
“I like [the restaurant] to be hidden, that’s why it’s so dark in here,” he said.
The restaurant will also be open six days a week.
“We’re only open Tuesday to Saturday [now, but] when we move to the new place, we’ll be open Mondays,” he said.
Mr Marr said that when he opened Soulsa he moved into a ready-made space. Moving to the new location gave him the opportunity to decorate it the way he wanted.
“I wanted to go into a new place, start from scratch and do everything how we wanted to do it. We’ve exposed the beams in there and stained them with a rimu stain and are doing everything in a semi-steampunk [décor],” he said.
They were aiming for an opening date sometime in November.
Mr Marr said for him the move was about making a fresh start.
“I just want a change; change is as good as a holiday,” he said.