Legendary Franklin Street bar will close after nearly 50 years in Chapel Hill

Linda’s Bar & Grill, a bar beloved within the UNC-Chapel Hill community for more than 50 years, will close for good on Friday, Jan. 5.

Owner Christopher Carini announced the closing with a chalkboard sign on the sidewalk outside the Franklin Street restaurant Tuesday. The decision to close comes three months after Carini set up a crowdfunding campaign to help cover the restaurant’s debts.

“This is the last thing I wanted to do, to have to close Linda’s,” Carini said in a phone interview Tuesday. “It’s really, really simple. The pandemic happened. Restaurants generally operate off of cash flow, but no one was around for two years.”

Linda’s was opened in 1976 by its namesake proprietor Linda Williams. Williams grew up in Chapel Hill and ran Linda’s for more than 30 years, eventually selling the bar in 2004, while still owning the building.

Generations of UNC students, alumni and Chapel Hill regulars found a community in Linda’s, as the bar grew to icon status among the historic haunts on Franklin Street.

Carini is Linda’s third owner, having bought the bar in 2011, three years after he moved to Chapel Hill. Carini had spent a career working in major corporate restaurants but wanted to own a bar of his own that was already steeped in tradition.

“I’ve seen people get engaged here, we’ve hosted wedding parties, baby showers, funeral after-parties,” Carini said in October. “We’ve hosted anything you can think of, where people want to gather and feel safe and warm; it’s a place to feel comfortable.”

News of Linda’s closing was first reported by the UNC student newspaper The Daily Tar Heel.

Owner sold pickup to cover payroll

The crowdfunding campaign was started by Carini in September 2023 to help cover the the six-figure debt the restaurant had taken on during the pandemic. That effort raised more than $35,000 of a $135,000 goal. At the time, Carini said Linda’s was not in immediate trouble, but that he worried about the next slow period.

Linda’s will close just before UNC students begin classes for the spring semester. Carini said the lull in business during the break factored into the timing of the closing. To cover the most recent payroll, Carini said he sold his personal pickup truck.

“The long and short of it is everyone leaves during break,” Carini said. “We’re busy for a couple days on game days, those are still busy....But since the pandemic food and alcohol sales have flipped. We can’t sustain like that.”

A chance to say goodbye to Linda’s

For its final week Linda’s will hit the high notes, holding its popular trivia on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and karaoke on Friday, its last night of service.

Carini said he thought it was important to give Linda’s a swan song instead of an abrupt shuttering.

“I wanted people to have a chance to come and say goodbye,” Carini said. “And I wanted to give the universe a chance to bring me someone to save it.”

Carini said he had already received a couple interested phone calls Tuesday.

Linda Williams, who still owns the building, said she learned Linda’s would close when her daughter sent her the DTH story on Tuesday.

“I hate to see Linda’s close,” Williams said.

Williams said she had no immediate plans to sell the building Linda’s occupies.

Williams lamented the recent development trend in Chapel Hill, particularly of higher buildings, saying Franklin Street looks markedly different than when she ran Linda’s more than a decade ago.

“It’s sad, it’s really sad. They’re putting up every piece of brown they can find, going up more and more floors,” Williams said. “I grew up in Chapel Hill. To me it looks destroyed.”

As for Linda’s, Williams herself sold the bar after nearly 40 years. She said she is proud of the legacy of Linda’s but also was happy to let it go.

“Linda’s means a great deal to me, but you can’t carry it on forever,” Williams said. “I’m sure it means a lot to a lot of people.”