Midtown may be gaining another bar, but one of its late-night restaurants will be relocating.
Munchies 420 Cafe, a Midtown restaurant popular for late-night snacking, will be replaced by The Rowdy Reptile bar.
Munchies, located at 1702 W. University Ave. in the UF Plaza, will be reopening at a different Gainesville location, but owner J.D. Chester said he couldn’t yet disclose where.
Chester, who also owns the downstairs bar Fat Daddy’s, said the space is being remodeled for The Rowdy Reptile, which will offer drink specials and affordable bar food.
The space has been undergoing renovations for about two weeks now, Chester said, and it could be open as soon as Friday.
Although menu items and prices have not been finalized, he said he expects the most expensive menu item will cost about $4.
He said moving Munchies and replacing it with a bar was a better fit for the area’s consumer base.
“The bar downstairs is so monumentally successful that we decided it made more sense,” Chester said.
The first of the two Munchies locations, which originated in Sarasota, was featured in the reality show Man v. Food about three years ago.
Chester said he felt that moving the Gainesville Munchies to a smaller space could evoke a small-town feel similar to that of the original restaurant.
The move will also give Munchies a chance to create a better atmosphere, he said.
“It needs bumper stickers all over the wall,” Chester said. “This place is just too big for that.”
The new location could possibly be a Munchies Express, Chester said, but all of the most popular items will be there.
Crispyn Coller, a 23-year-old UF alumnus who works at UF Plaza, said he was a little disappointed by the decision to turn the space into a bar because there are already so many drink venues in Midtown.
Munchies contributed to Midtown, Coller said, because it stayed open later than other nearby establishments.
Coller said he usually ate at Munchies because it was convenient, and now that it’s moving, he said he’ll miss the Dankalicious Chicken Nugs, which he said were his favorite.
“If (the new location) is in the area, I would eat there,” Coller said. “But I wouldn’t necessarily go out of my way.”
Munchies opened in UF Plaza in 2011.
Christopher Gagne, a security guard at UF Plaza, works behind a countertop at Munchies 420 Cafe on West University Avenue Monday afternoon.
