Choctaw Restaurant Announces Closure, Says Rent Hike Is To Blame

A local restaurant announced its closure on social media, saying that due to a large increase in rent price, they cannot afford to stay open.

Tuesday, January 30th 2024, 3:10 pm

By: News 9

CHOCTAW, Okla. -

Charlie’s Sports Bar & Grill in Choctaw has announced its closure on social media.

According to the statement on Facebook, the restaurant is closing due to several reasons. One of which, is rent increases:

“As many of you know, we’ve been looking at trying to find a new home for Charlie’s for a couple of years now due to the fact that we’ve just simply outgrown our current location. The search to find something that is suitable for our needs out here in Eastern Oklahoma County has been really difficult to say the least. The reasoning we’ve been under the gun to find something is because we knew that our current lease would be up March 1st, while we anticipated a rent increase, we put some things in place to offset that rent increase, or so we thought. After meeting with our new landlords today, the new rent increase is much more substantial than ever anticipated. While also changing the lease terms regarding responsibilities for repairs, etc pretty dramatically. Ultimately we feel it would be very reckless and irresponsible to sign a lease we know we can’t afford in this economy with the current inflation and downturn all restaurants are experiencing at this time…”

The statement goes on to say that they have chosen not to renew their lease, and that February 18th will be their last day of operation.

The restaurant’s post concluded with thanking supporters and offering employment help to those who will be soon out of a job.

“To all our families, Charlie’s family, friends, customers that have supported us over the years we cannot thank you enough for all your love, support, and patronage. I’m sure there will be more posts and probably some tears as we have more time to process and reflect on everything.

We hope to see a lot of you over the next few weeks as we say goodbye and end an era.

*We’d like to add for all our friends with businesses in the industry, we’ve got a lot of great staff and would like to help place them in new employment when we close. Please reach out to us if you’re looking.”