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Dearborn Businesses Come and Go; Others on Hold

Opening soon: The Well pub in Dearborn.

Opening soon: The Well pub in Dearborn.

A new pub called The Well is soon set to open in the West Village Commons development on Michigan Avenue.

The Well’s co-Owner Ross Varacalli, a Dearborn resident, said the new bar (next to the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory in the West Village Commons) is completed and in the process of getting the needed paperwork completed so it can open. We took a peek inside and it looks good with its stained wood-paneled walls and stone face bar.

Varacalli was hoping to have the pub open in time for Dearborn Homecoming but the paper approval process has taken a bit longer than anticipated.

This is the second location for The Well. The first Well is located in Detroit at 1228 Randolph St. That pub opened in 1997 and Varacalli and his team have owned it for the last five years. The Well in Detroit draws a student-heavy clientele from Wayne State University and the University of Detroit.

While gaining the Well in the West Village Commons is a good addition, another business in the development has decided to close its doors.

The latest west Dearborn business casuality.

The latest west Dearborn business casualty.

American Home Fitness, one of the first tenants in the West Village Commons, closed its doors, adding to the recent string of west Dearborn business casualties.

 The store carried top line exercise equipment and in this economy people simply do not have the disposable income for $1,000 exercise machines.

Finally, just west of American Home Fitness, at the southwest corner of Michigan Avenue and Military sits the Gateway Plaza. One of the businesses working to move into the development is a restaurant called Caliente Grille. While some work has been completed on the restaurant, legal battles have now slowed the project to a crawl.

This week restaurant co-owner Jeremy Sutton and Gateway Plaza developer Hakim Fakhoury will be back in Dearborn District Court on Aug. 21. Fakhoury is trying to evict the restaurant and its owners, claiming they failed to move forward with their restaurant. Sutton is countersuing, claiming breach of contract. Dearborn 19th District Court Judge Mark Somers will try to sort the matter in his courtroom this week.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 17th, 2009 at 6:20 am and is filed under Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  • Bill

    While I am not a fan of another bar opening in West Dearborn, I suppose something is better than nothing. I wish Mr. Varacalli well in his endeavors. Does anyone know what is going on with the Fat Burger? Does anyone truly know what is going on with the Newman buildings? Dearborn waits and wonders.

  • dearborn’s interests

    hey everyone,

    obviously there is a reason as to why hakim would want to evict someone. commercial landlords are in the business of keeping tenants not evicting them. a tenant has to default over and over to get evicted.

    we might all remember that caliente’s construction was at a stand-still for some time, and that had nothing to do with hakim fakhoury, and everything to do with jeremy sutton dragging his feet. eventually, a landlord has enough of that.

    believe it or not, it is actually more costly to have a tenant that is not paying rent than an empty space.

    in any case, i imagine there might be discussion following said’s posting, and i just wanted to lay out some ideas.

    thanks!

  • http://www.networkdearborn.com Dave Bowman

    Couple of comments:

    1) I’ve been asking how AHF has been able to keep its doors open for some time now. Nice product line but wrong location for a business of this type…

    2) “…But the paper approval process has taken a bit longer than anticipated.” This is a common thread to every business storyline in Dearborn.

  • LifelongDbnRes

    I’m glad that Judge Somers gets to work that one out and not me—sounds like it’s going to be complicated. As a younger citizen whose friends frequent the Mich. Ave bar scene even though I don’t, I’m actually anticipating the Well. It looks like something more my style. We shall see….

  • Donna Hay

    You are so right Dave that’s about all we hear – this is going to take just a little longer than we anticipated. Think we can forget about Fatburger going in and also C. Grille. You just can’t work on those 2 places forever – well, maybe you can. We wondered how long AHF would last when it first went in, very poor location for that type of business.

  • becki kain

    I thought Newman was the hold up for Calienti, for him suing them because the building would look too nice in comparison to his run down building on the other side?

  • emanon

    …and a rim shot for Becki! Good one.

  • JD

    How about a more realistic realtor’s perspective on what is driving Mr. Hakim to try and evict the ONLY business client he has in that project. It all has to do with the contract he signed years ago with Mr. Jerry. Just like Panera Bread, Mr. Jerry has months if not years of free rent coming to him because the building wasn’t completed on time. that’s why people sign contracts. so if you are Mr. Hakim having an empty building is better than having a client there paying you nothing.

  • fred

    east dearborn is alive and thriving with businesses, pedestrian culture, and a healthy community+market relationship. celebrate this.