Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

Embers moved into the old Pie-Tanza location in this upscale little strip mall on Polo Road probably some time in 2014. In the event, I ate there once, and decided it was ok, but nothing special enough to make the drive. (I do recall that they had fixed the water pressure issues in the bathroom that had affected Pie-Tanza).

When I was out that way today to use the contract Post Office in the convenience store, I noticed a new nameplate on the building. The new tenant is Upper Crust, also a pizza establishment. Since their sign proclaims that they were founded in 2017 (17 March 2017 according to The State), that's what I will use as the closing date for Embers.

Not sure exactly when Allstar closed, but Columbiafoodienews says that Papa Gios was prepping this spot to open on 16 December 2016, so Allstar must have been closed for probably a month or more by then. I'm just going to say "Fall 2016".

I do love me some pizza, but I never made it to this spot. Lexington is a good drive, and if it were normal hours, and I were going that far, I would probably get some Parthenon style pizza at Pizzeria Opa or it it were later, Uno.

Interestingly, Papa Gios seems to have all its locations in Orlando and the Midlands, which is a fairly unusual distribution.

(Hat tip to commenter James R)

Northern Style Pizza replaced Touchdown's Wings & Things in this little Broad River Road endcap location, which had previously been a Sammi's Deli and probably a few other things before that.

The last Yelp review is from June of 2016, so I'm going with a "Summer 2016" closing date. The replacement operation, Papa Gio's, is also a pizza & Italian restaurant. Their sign says "Established 2007", so they must have moved here from another location, but not one I am familiar with.

This was the follow-on operation to BJ's Cafe, and looks to have been open only during the spring & summer of 2016.

As commenter badger speculated it is now to become Chickadees Diner location and according to their Facebook they hope to be open at the start of October.

(Hat tip to commenter Justin)

Commenter Mr. BO pointed out this Bluff Road closing after recently wanting a pizza on that side of town, but it appears that Stromboli's was gone long before that.

I wish I had known about this place when I was working out on Bluff Road, so that maybe I wouldn't have had to drive all the way to Garners Ferry to find a halfway decent lunch.

(Hat tip to commenter Mr. BO)

East Coast Pizzeria was the follow-on operation to Brixx in this Sandhill corner apartment block. Honestly, I was not impressed the one time I ate there. It seemed like the ordering process to just get the toppings I wanted on a pizza was unnecessarily complicated, and the resulting pizza was nothing special. Perhaps I should have given it another shot, but the reason I was a semi-regular at Brixx was because they were open late-night, which East Coast was not.

It will be interesting to see if Sandhill is able to get another restaurant in here. Probably the residents upstairs will be just as glad if not, as Brixx set the place on fire once..

(Hat tip to commenter Sidney)

Considering the place was open from 1981 and considering how much I like pizza and Italian food in general, I'm not sure how I was totally unaware of Tony's. Perhaps because of the location, if ever I saw it, I thought "no parking", or perhaps it's because they closed at 2:30 and it would always be later when I would drive by -- I don't really know. At any rate, this Washington Plaza storefront is vacant now.

(Hat tip to commenter Julie)

After Trevin mentioned that this place was closing, I drove over and got some pictures while it was still open.. and of course now can't find them: The first picture above is actually from the Lane Bryant closing.

At any rate, I used to eat here about once a week while I worked off of Bluff Road. I didn't eat the pizza because pizza for lunch tends to shut down my brain for the rest of the day, but I would get the salad bar and some garlic bread. Shoney's probably had a better salad bar, but given my very limited time for lunch, I couldn't deal with possible delays in getting the ticket, and Cici's was self-serve and perfectly adequate. I also liked the fact that they always had a survey on the the ticket for $2.00 off next time if you filled it out. That covered the drink.

Not sure what the closing circumstances were. As far as I could tell, the place did a pretty good business, and in fact while I was taking these pictures, two different cars drove by, clearly looking to eat.

(Hat tip to commenter Trevin)

UPDATE 27 April 2016 -- Here are the pix from 12 April 2016 that I couldn't find before:

UPDATE 20 July 2016 -- Mod Pizza is open, but in the suite to the right of Cici's:

Pizza Pizza! -- Little Caesar in Irmo has moved slightly down Saint Andrews Road from this spot at 6903 to the old Blockbuster at 7249:

Interestingly, when I was googling the address, I turned up a LoopNet listing with a much better picture than I was able to take against the sun -- but with the building clearly marqueed as Custom Pizza Co.

(Hat tip to commenter Homer)

Touchdown's opened in a former Sammi's Deli sometime around October 2013. I'm not a big wing fan, and it's nowhere near where I live so I never made it in. I noticed last weekend as I was drive by that it was closed and had been relaced by a pizza operation: