In 2023, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport announced Atlanta’s own Slutty Vegan would be coming to Concourse B. But less than two years later, those plans have fallen apart.
Last month, airport officials approved a request by Slutty Vegan’s concessionaire partners to replace the Concourse B location with a Buffalo Wild Wings and a new Asian-Southern fusion concept called Wu Tang Asian Kitchen.
Both are set to open in December, according to documents obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution via an open records request.
The news comes after the vegan burger chain’s founder Aisha “Pinky” Cole briefly lost control of her company earlier this year and then reacquired it through a restructuring.
Multiple Slutty Vegan locations have closed recently and over the past few years. The chain has faced lawsuits — including from former employees with allegations over pay, which have since been settled.
A spokesperson for Cole did not respond to multiple requests for comment from the AJC.
Credit: Madelynne Boykin
Credit: Madelynne Boykin
Cole’s vegan burger chain has risen to national prominence since its debut as a food truck in 2019. She opened Slutty Vegan’s first brick-and-mortar location that same year and ultimately expanded to 14 locations across four states.
Today the company operates five restaurants, according to its website. Two locations of Bar Vegan — another restaurant and cocktail bar Cole co-founded — also shuttered this year.
Airport’s ‘first vegan concept ever’
In an April 2024 interview on the AJC’s “The Monica Pearson Show,” Cole predicted the airport location would open in the third quarter of that year as “the first vegan concept ever to be in the airport.”
At an August event about how a wave of Black entrepreneurs were struggling, she was candid: “I don’t really have a revenue issue, but I can’t keep talent, because nothing is stable. People aren’t spending their money, so as much as I want to pay my employees more, if I pay them more, I’ll make less money. So, my bottom line is going to be red.”
By November the concessionaires were first notified of “potential business and financial difficulties within the Slutty Vegan organization,” according to documents reviewed by the AJC.
That same month, Slutty Vegan announced it was looking for a new president.
In January the concessionaire team, which includes Delaware North and H&H Hospitality, said it decided to scale down Slutty Vegan to a smaller concept and find another brand to share the Concourse B space.
But by February, according to their change request, the team determined Slutty Vegan “to be no longer sustainable or viable for this location” and began looking for replacement brands. That is the same month Cole lost control of her company.
In a statement to the AJC, a founding partner of H&H Randy Hazelton said the license agreement with the restaurant chain “became null and void as a result of Slutty Vegan losing ownership of the brand while going through the restructuring.”
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
“The decision was made due to the uncertainty of the direction of the brand in light of this event,” he said.
Delaware North spokesperson Charlie Roberts said in a written statement that during Slutty Vegan’s restructuring, its leadership and H&H “mutually agreed that moving forward with an airport location was not the best path at this time. We appreciate the collaboration and wish Pinky Cole and the Slutty Vegan team continued success in their next chapter.”
New openings
The Buffalo Wild Wings coming to the former Slutty Vegan space will be the second Hartsfield-Jackson outpost for the national chain based in Atlanta, after its existing space in Concourse D.
The new Wu Tang Asian Kitchen concept that’s also opening in Concourse B promises to blend “Asian and Southern soul food in a modern, fast-casual setting,” according to the change of concept request document.
Hazelton confirmed it would be a collaboration between two Atlanta chefs, Jason McClure and Maximilian Hines, and builds on past local pop-ups they previously worked on together. Hines is currently the executive chef at Breaker Breaker and founded Stolen Goods, a pop-up collective.
Meanwhile, in an April interview Cole told UATL that “Slutty Vegan 2.0″ was underway and would include new international deals, new uniforms and menu items.
Cole opened a new concept featuring vegan hoagies, Voagies, on Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard last month.
“Slutty Vegan 2.0 is bigger than just food,” she told UATL, referencing possible brand partnerships, cosmetics and clothing.
“It’s a lifestyle brand, and I want people to see that and know that.”
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