Marketplace

A Fires Closes Lai Lai

A January 16 kitchen fire has closed longtime Chinese restaurant Lai Lai in Arbor Square Plaza at Carpenter and Ellsworth, but the owner aims to reopen there with community support. No one was hurt in the blaze, but the damage...

Read More

Root is Closed

Root, the underground cocktail bar at 201 S. First St., closed rather suddenly at the end of January, though ownership intends to reopen in some form. Its Facebook post of January 28 reads in part, “This will be the final night...

Read More

A Second Sweetgreen

Less than two months after opening on S. State St. downtown, the salad chain Sweetgreen celebrated the launch of its second location on March 21 in the Arbor Hills shopping center. The fast-casual concept prioritizes fresh and...

Read More

Burlington is Back

The Maple Village shopping center on the city’s west side now hosts a new off-price retail chain to replace the defunct Stein Mart, which closed in 2020. Burlington Stores will mark its Ann Arbor reappearance—there was one in...

Read More

Tesla Opens, Silently

Tesla, the automotive company known for, among other things, disrupting the industry’s dealership model by selling directly to consumers, opened its Ann Arbor retail showroom in recent weeks, as quietly as its electric motors....

Read More

Sweetgreen Opens on S. State

Students lined up in advance on opening day at Sweetgreen, a fast-casual restaurant chain focused on salads. Corporate spokesperson Grace Demeritt thinks it’s a sign of the brand’s surging popularity—and also possibly the impact...

Read More

After the Fire

Madras Masala was in its twentieth year as a full-service Indian restaurant with a popular lunch buffet. Vape City had shared its Maynard St. building for fewer than two years when both businesses went up in smoke the morning of...

Read More

Verbena Closes After Nine Years on S. State

Verbena, the student-focused women’s clothing boutique at 309 S. State St. since 2014, is expected to close by the end of February. The store was a father-daughter partnership between longtime Ann Arbor businessman Bob Duerksen...

Read More

Dispo opens on Ellsworth

On Ellsworth, the party store near University Townhouses has transitioned from liquor to ganja: After an extensive renovation, it’s now Dispo. Though nine other Michigan locations share the name, Dispo (short for “dispensary”)...

Read More

Sticky Ann Arbor Replaces Huron View

It’s been fourteen years since Michigan voters approved medical marijuana and just three since they opened the door to recreational sales, but already the decades of prohibition are taking on a retrospective glow. Before bud...

Read More

Upcoming Events

Upcoming Nightspots