I seem to recall passing by a sign they had up saying something about an upcoming closing when I was out hunting for quick food during an internship I had downtown this Spring. April or May, at least.

I was talking to someone the other day about this. With their departure, downtown is now home to only two restaurant chains, Subway and Lenny's. That is if you don't count Starbucks as a restaurant. That's a remarkably small minority.
~m.

Apparently the company's business is still solid. There was an earlier report that the company had decided to stop funding anti-gay organizations, but I never saw anything confirmed. Don't forget about the outrage over layoffs threatened by Papa John's and Darden Restaurants in response to the ACA. (Darden is the parent company of pretty much all the other crappy chain restaurants.)

Edit: As for why this branch of Chik Fil A closed, I don't know. But knowing a little about the politics of a great many daytime occupants of the various private and government office buildings downtown, I doubt it had much at all to do with gay solidarity.

I doubt that, too. But my theory is that a business can only anticipate a certain number of free refills on iced tea, and this location destroyed that model. There were many sad faces the first day or so.
~m.

There are a bunch of Blue Coast Burritos. There are four Tupelo Honeys.

Still a low percentage, but Subway and Lenny's are not alone.

And a couple of Namas. And Soccer Taco. But all are local.

Olive Garden Suffering From Bad PR After Anti-Obamacare Comments

I guess the word "franchise" might be a better term than chain. I don't regard Tomato Head as a chain, even though there's more than one location. And I think that's going to exclude most that have been named, other than perhaps Blue Coast. I don't know if they are a franchise. And I'm going to exclude Rita's from the restaurant category.

I'd welcome a Waffle House at the former Arby's location.
~m.

My source on this is an assistant manager who told me this information in early November soon after the employees were notified of the closing. I believe it to be true. Otherwise I would not be posting:

When the local franchisee (Eddie, something or other) opened a new Chick-Fil-A on Kingston Pike near Homburg place, "corporate" began looking for somebody to take over the downtown store. Prospective new owners couldn't make the numbers work; downtown they did a great breakfast and lunch business. Not so much in the evenings after all the downtown crowd went home. And hardly any business on Saturday (again, no lawyers, bankers or government workers coming in to buy chicken). With what would be a high overhead for rent, the profit margins just didn't work. So the store closed on Wednesday before Thanksgiving.
It had nothing to do with politics (the controversy earlier in the summer). It was simple economics.