Old Pizza Hut location to reopened as tobacco store
Will also sell vaping supplies, beer
The former Pizza Hut building in Clinton will be converted into a tobacco and beer store, pending approval of an off-premises beer sales permit by the city, the new shop’s owner says.
The Eagle Smoke Shop will be the sole occupant of the former pizza restaurant at 1112 N. Charles G. Seivers Blvd., and should open within the next two months, owner Kishan Patel said Monday.
“We will have pipe tobacco, cigarettes and vaping supplies,” Patel said.
The application for the beer permit will be heard by the City of Clinton Beer Board at a called meeting at 5:30 p.m. Monday, Feb. 28, according to a legal notice posted by the city. The Clinton City Council sits as the beer board.
Patel’s address on the application to the beer board is listed as 122 E. Division Road, Oak Ridge, which he said is the site of another tobacco and beer store he operates, called Smoking Joe Tobacco.
He also owns Anderson Discount Tobacco & Market at 705 Main St. in Oliver Springs, as well as other tobacco stores outside Anderson County, Patel said.
Patel already has obtained a city of Clinton building permit for demolition of the interior of the former Pizza Hut building, and that work is already underway.
That permit, for $24,000 worth of work, was issued Jan. 20 in Patel’s name. He has not yet applied for a permit to build the new interior of the tobacco shop.
Still, Patel said Monday, “We will probably open within one to two months.”
City officials said last year that someone was looking at the old Pizza Hut building as the potential site for a liquor store, but City Manager Roger Houck said Friday that those plans have since changed.
There are two other liquor/wine package stores already close to opening in Clinton – one near the Buddy’s bar-b-q restaurant on North Charles G. Seivers Boulevard near Interstate 75, Exit 122, and the other next to the China Inn restaurant at 1115 N. Seivers Blvd. in the same building as United Grocery Outlet and directly across the street from the old Pizza Hut.
Both of those package stores are expected to open within the next month, and are already being stocked. The one near Buddy’s is called SP’s Wine & Liquor, which is also owned by a Patel family, but is not related to Kishan Patel, he said.
The former Pizza Hut property was purchased on Dec. 1, 2021, by RAM SAI 9 LLC., whose principal owner is listed as Kishan Patel. Purchase price in county property records was $445,000.
Clinton’s Pizza Hut restaurant closed in 2020 when its parent company, one of the largest Pizza Hut franchisees, filed for bankruptcy reorganization and closed about 300 of its stores.