It’s been nearly two months since four of the Subway locations in Springfield closed, but those restaurants are now under new ownership and will be reopening soon.
Vern Evans, who was the franchisee for eight Subway locations, retired after 25 years in the central Illinois market. He operated the store at 607 E. Adams St. in downtown Springfield, plus 417 South Grand Ave. E., 2359 W. Monroe St. and 1827 W. Jefferson St., which all closed Jan. 14. In the surrounding areas, VCM Inc. operated Subway stores in Sherman, Divernon, Taylorville and Farmersville.
“We’ve purchased six of his eight locations,” said Hannah Schumacher, whose family owns and operates 45 Subway restaurants. The new franchisee, ECI Investments, is based in Effingham.
“It’s a family business, my father started it about 33 years ago,” she said. “I’ve been doing this full time for 15 years.”
Schumacher said her family now owns the Taylorville store, which never closed, and the Divernon Subway.
“That one is open and operating – it was closed for about a month, so some people don’t realize it’s back open now, but we’ve got a great team of managers at that store,” she said.
Not included in the sale were locations in Sherman and Farmersville. Schumacher said she wasn’t certain of the future of the Farmersville Subway, but “the one in Sherman, unfortunately, will not be reopening.”
However, there is an aggressive schedule in place for reopening the four Springfield locations.
“We are working to reopen these stores as quickly as we can,” Schumacher said. “We are hiring for all of the locations, looking for customer service-oriented people.” She said anyone interested in applying should contact Sierra Grimsely, district supervisor, at sgrimsley_subway11506@yahoo.com.
“We’ve had professionals come in and do some deep cleaning and organizing at all of the locations,” said Schumacher. Open job interviews were held March 11 at the downtown Subway, and she said the goal is to reopen that location first.
“Hopefully we’ll have that one open within the next five to 10 business days,” she said.
Monroe is next on the list, followed by Jefferson, and finally the South Grand store, which is slated for a makeover.
“That one is going to be a little bit more of a project,” Schumacher said. “We’re hoping to do some renovations to the building itself.”
She noted that under the new ownership the locations will accept coupons for all products, which the previous owner did not. Schumacher said she also hopes to work with schools and local organizations to provide discounted catering.
“We really pride ourselves on being engaged with these communities,” she said. “We’re excited to pull people in and give them a really good experience.”
