278 Restaurant to reopen under ownership of another Etowah County restaurant

GADSDEN, AL (WBRC) - Etowah County's beloved 278 Restaurant will soon be taking orders again.

The beloved meat and three on Highway 278 just between East Gadsden, Glencoe and Hokes Bluff, closed abruptly July 31. That's when the previous operator said he was losing money, and reached a deadline to sign a lease or move out.

The new lessee is a familiar face because he's the owner of an iconic Etowah County restaurant, Beans & Greens in Ballplay.

Beans & Greens owner Bobby Boles is promising some changes and more of the same: the lunch buffet, which ended under the previous owner, will return. And the menu will be a combination of favorites from both restaurants. Their chicken fingers, for instance, will once again be hand-breaded.

The previous operator felt he made two changes that may have hurt business were to eliminate the buffet and make it a non-smoking restaurant. Boles says the smoking ban will stay in place.

But one big change is in store: Boles add an extra shift so the restaurant can serve three meals a day.

And that means even more employees, in addition to the 18 workers Boles hopes to hire back.

"We're going to talk to most all the employees that they had, try to get them their job back," Boles said. "And we're probably going to open up a second shift, so we'll be hiring extra folks. So we'll have more folks coming in than was previously here."

In fact, Boles says WBRC's previous stories about the closing of the 278--and the reaction to those stories on social media--inspired him to look into the idea of taking the restaurant over. He agreed with the previous operator that the 40-year-old restaurant was in a prime location, near three cities as well as Gadsden Regional Medical Center and the Goodyear Tire plant.

Beans & Greens itself has been in business for 17 years, with Boles in charge for the past 14. He says customers have come from all over, even west Georgia, despite the fact the Beans & Greens flagship location is on old Centre Highway, in a remote rural area.

Beans & Greens previously operated another location in Alexandria.

Boles says he hopes to have the restaurant serving meals around August 26-29.

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