Hometown burger giant leaving Short North location after more than 50 years

The Columbus-based burger restaurant White Castle has operated its High Street eatery in the Short North for more than 50 years, but now it’s ready on move on from the space.

According to White Castle president of marketing and public relations Jamie Richardson, the restaurant located at 965 N. High St. will close on Dec. 24. White Castle currently occupies the ground floor of a building that was erected in 2018 at this address, but it’s had a location there since 1968.

Citing sales that never fully received from COVID-19, Richardson said White Castle believes the High Street location will be more useful housing another tenant.

“We’re still family owned after 101 years, and one of the things we’ve learned in that time is every property is different; Over time the best use of a property can evolve or change,” he said.

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Alongside the local property management group Borror, White Castle is the partial owner of the building their Short North eatery currently occupies. A new tenant has not been named yet.

According to Richardson, eight employees of the Short North White Castle will be transferred to the eatery’s location at 4525 Kenny Rd., which will allow that storefront to operate 24 hours a day, instead of 16. The remaining Short North employees have been reassigned to other Columbus locations as well.

“We’re still a family-owned company, and that allows us to sit down with employees to figure out which location works best for each employees,” Richardson said. “It’s not something where we send a text message the night before to let people know, we sat with our team to tell them what was going on, and to figure out the best way forward.”

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