After less than eight months in business, The Big Salad in downtown Traverse City has permanently shut its doors.

A sign recently appeared on the restaurant’s front door informing patrons of the closure. “We are unfortunately closing our business,” the sign read. “Thank you for all the loyal patronage and all the smiles.”

The Big Salad marked its grand opening in late October 2022 when it set up shop in the 332 East Front Street space formerly occupied by Yen Yoga & Fitness. Local franchise owners Nathan Blessing and Ben Jackson executed significant renovations of the space to covert it into a restaurant. In the lead-up to the opening, Blessing told The Ticker that the local community had been “very welcoming to us” throughout the construction period.

Once open, The Big Salad served a menu with “more than 17 million possible combinations of hand-crafted iceberg, romaine, or spinach salads, and a choice of 40 toppings and 30 varieties of dressings,” along with smoothies, sandwiches, wraps, and soups.

The fall grand opening also marked the first northern Michigan location for The Big Salad, a Michigan-based chain with locations in Ann Arbor, Grosse Pointe Woods, Woodhaven, Charlotte, Detroit, and Farmington. Additionally, The Big Salad website touts one out-of-state location currently in operation, in Spring, Texas, and a second, in Cincinnati, Ohio, that is “coming soon.” 

Traverse City is no longer listed as a location on the Big Salad website, and the Facebook page for the local franchise confirms that the business is “permanently closed.” Neither Blessing nor Jackson could immediately be reached for comment about the decision to close the Traverse City franchise.