Fast-Casual Mediterranean Chain Closes All Austin Restaurants

Daphne’s Mediterranean, the California-based fast-casual chain that took over Austin’s similar chain Noon Mediterranean (née Verts), closed up all of its Austin restaurants. This means six locations from West Anderson Lane to the Drag to East Riverside Drive. There is no word on what will happen to these restaurants as of now.

“We decided that the sales performances of these locations were not up to our expectations,” said director of marketing David Eldredge through a press statement. The company is still open to expanding with other Texas locations though.

Originally, Noon was called VertsKebap, a German-style street food cart focusing on doner kebabs in 2011 by co-founders Michael Heyne and Dominik Stein in Austin. The restaurant grew quickly with locations throughout Texas and the East Coast. It underwent a slight name change in 2016 to Verts.

Verts’s name completely changed to Noon Mediterranean in 2017, as a way to make the type of restaurant clearer to people. Then the company filed for bankruptcy in August 2018, when it closed multiple locations throughout the country and laid off staffers.

When Daphne’s took over Noon in December 2018, Heyne and Stein were no longer part of the company. It transformed those six remaining Austin restaurants into Daphne’s branding by the spring of 2019. Daphne’s opened in 1991 in Del Mar, California by founder George Katakalidis.

• A California Chain Is Taking Over Beleaguered Noon Mediterranean [EATX]
• Verts Replacement Restaurant Embarks on Ambitious Reopening Plan [EATX]
• All Coverage of Daphne’s [EATX]