After seven years and a rough post-COVID season, The Hive Bodega “no longer exists.”
“I just wanted to simplify my life,” said owner Eric Kinlaw, who announced on social media Monday that the downtown specialty grocery store would be closing its doors permanently.
Since May 2015, The Hive offered locally sourced produce, pantry items, vegan dishes and craft beer and wine from its location on the corner of 10th and Ellis Streets. The COVID pandemic led to its temporarily shutting down in the middle of 2020, alongside its sister business, The Bee’s Knees, which Kinlaw also owns.
Both came back in August 2021, but The Hive struggled amid staff shortages. In what Kinlaw described as a gradual “soft closing,” it temporarily shut down in February, close to First Friday, and hasn’t really opened since.
“It’s a complicated thing,” said Kinlaw. “I didn’t want to let it go because it’s another baby of mine. But I just felt like it was it was difficult reopening them.”
After clearing the space of its restaurant equipment in a liquidation sale, Kinlaw will be leasing it to another to another business-owner for their own restaurant concept.
In turn, he is refocusing the rest of his energies on The Bee’s Knees. Both concepts operated within the same building, owned by Kinlaw, but in separate spaces.
“The Bee’s Knees came first anyway,” said Kinlaw, who opened the eatery in August of 2002. “All we have to do is close the door. I have The Bee’s Knees, and somebody has their new thing right next door.”
Kinlaw aims to further retool the café into an intimate event space, serving alcohol and hosting live music and other downtown happenings, such as Art Night every third Thursday. After striving to keep two businesses afloat, Kinlaw has no qualms letting one chapter end in order to push forward.
“I’m happy with the way Bee’s Knees is going and the future that I have for that,” he said. “I just saw that I just kind of want fewer responsibilities in my life. I don’t need to do so much. Time to live again.”
The Bee’s Knees is still at 211 10th St.
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter covering education in Columbia County and business-related topics for The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
