Papalinos Cardinal Towne closed

After posting on their Facebook page Tuesday that they were closing for "store maintenance" at 5 PM, Papalinos posted yesterday, "We regret that we had to close the UofL location today. It is a very sad day for the Papalinos family. We hope that you continue to support the Papalinos family at Baxter Ave."

Anyone know more about this? Some commenters on Facebook said they'd heard the Cardinal Towne location wasn't doing enough late-night business, but it's hard for me to believe that would be a serious factor. If other places in there can pay the rent doing far less business, surely Papalinos could make a go of it off the slamming lunch business they did every day.

The maintenance post made me wonder if they had a piece of equipment die that was too expensive to replace, but I don't know if that makes sense either.

I'm not surprised, lousy and disinterested service, took forwever to get food.

Damn. I hate to hear this. Allan is a good dude.

I loved having it nearby, but it did take a long time to get a slice.

That's the only one we've been to. When there was an event on campus - that's where we would stop. Crave the pizza slices so we'll have to venture closer to Bardstown Road - maybe a Saturday afternoon would be a good time.

Sad to see this location close its doors. I preferred Cardinal Towne to the Baxter location as it had more indoor seating and I actually found the service to be faster.

Papa John is behind this, I'm sure.

I really liked being able to stop there to get a pie to take home. It's a shame.

That's too bad. They were my favorite of that cluster of restaurants. Having said that, though, I can't say that I'm surprised. The economics of Cardinal Towne never made any sense to me. Despite all of the students at UofL, I firmly believe there isn't enough business to go around for all of those places. Papalino's was just the first--there will probably be 2 or 3 more.

After talking with a few more folks, it sounds like a combination of less business than expected and rents that had already been raised a couple of times forced this closing. As Scott said, this may not be the first time this happens - unless the landlords wanted Papalinos out specifically, for some reason.

Ugh...

I live on 4th St and this was my go to pizza. They have not been delivering for about two months now always siting the lack of a driver. Now it seems it was worse than that. Shame.

Hello Everyone,
I will start off by saying thank you to everyone who supported our U of L location and everyone who continues to support our Baxter Ave. location. It was a sad day for us to have to close U of L we did everything we possibly could to keep it open even jeopardizing our Baxter location. Everything on paper made this look like a homerun but overhead was just to high for the amount of sales coming in. We were brought into this project with hopes of being put on the student meal plan which never happened and the cost of rent plus utilities and the overhead of running a much larger store was just out of our reach. Business was good just not good enough. Yes we had strong lunches but dinners were mediocre at best and weekends were pretty soft. We will continue to strive and produce the best pizza we possibly can at our Baxter Ave. location, so please come visit us! Thanks once again for everyones support and kind words.

Sincerely,
Allan Rosenberg
Owner
Papalinos NY Pizzeria

I feel your pain Allan. We had the same problem in that area.

As long as I can get my fix on Baxter, we are going to be ok.

Word on the street is that there is another LOCAL pizza business going to take the space. NOT Papa Johns. If what I have heard comes to fruition then it will be ok.

If they have the same rate of lease payments it's going to be hard. I get the impression the owners of the property think they are in a major East Coast City or serving a private university.

Super Chefs those purveyors of breakfasts in other restaurant locations have begun to serve breakfast Wednesday through Sunday in the Cluckers in Cardinal Towne. Comments I heard were they had the ESPN on Sunday morning at 0800 at way too high a sound level for the hangovers and their prices are "EXPENSIVE", that word used multiple times. They are not inexpensive and I don't know if that crowd is going to be a continuing source of business. One person talking in our group said the breakfast tacos were really good but a dollar too high each. e.g. $9.99 was too much and that $6.99 would be a better price.

I agree that location needs a good breakfast restaurant. Just don't know exactly what right now.

Is Windy City pizza still open down there on 4th? If so people still have one of the best options in the city by UL.