New BBQ restaurant going in the former Sunshine Bakery building

Kim Vickers
·2 min read

AUGUSTA, Ga (WJBF)- When one door closes another opens. Soon, downtown Augusta will get a new business in a historic location.

Fat Man’s Hospitality Group is opening a BBQ restaurant in the old ‘Sunshine Bakery’ building. The bakery closed in 2020 after decades in business. The pandemic forced a lot of businesses to close and ‘Sunshine Bakery’ was one of them. But now the old building will get new life.

Construction has already begun for ‘Bradley’s BBQ,’ which has existed as a catering branch of ‘Fat Man’s Cafe’ for years.

The Usry Family have been business owners in Augusta for more than 70 years, starting with the holiday store ‘Fat Man’s Forest’ and ‘Fat Man’s Cafe.’ Fat Man’s Hospitality owns several other restaurants including ‘Southern Salad’ and the historic ‘Sno Cap’ in North Augusta.

Havird Usry, a partner in the company, said now they are adding ‘Bradley’s BBQ’ to the mix, offering fresh BBQ and sides along with a full bar.

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“I think it’s a void in our downtown market, barbecue is. We’re also going to have a full bar, so we’re gonna be open six days a week for lunch and dinner. But our main focus is the food. We want all of the proteins to be on point. We want all the sides to be on point. So we want to do a few things within the barbecue concept, but do them all really well.”

Usry said the company tries to open new businesses in empty historic buildings.

“We come from a Fat Man’s family which is something nostalgic in this community. So we like to get our hands on these older buildings and really take the resources from the businesses that we create to really put back into the building and into the business to improve the actual building, but also improve this area. Because we’re really invested in downtown,” he explained.

‘Bradley’s BBQ’ is named for Usry’s youngest daughter, who he said is very excited about the new restaurant.

Usry told NewsChannel 6 that they plan to pay homage to the historic ‘Sunshine Bakery’ by incorporating part of the outdoor signage in their indoor decor in a meaningful way.

They started construction yesterday and Usry is hoping to be open by September.

Photojournalist: Dania Alawir.

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