Soulful Soups to close in downtown Spokane next week

A downtown restaurant owner recently inked a deal for the third time to sell Soulful Soups & Spirits by the end of last year. But just before the transaction could be consummated, her landlord raised the lease by $1,200 a month and tanked it.

As a result, Lauren D’Arienzo said the popular lunch spot at 117 N. Howard St., which she worked hard to continue, will close April 17.

“It’s not even the financial part the makes me sad. It’s part of my legacy,” D’Arienzo said. “I always pictured it going on and on and continuing as a staple like Domini’s or O’Doherty’s.”

Soulful Soups opened in January 2000 under a previous owner. D’Arienzo purchased it in 2011 and managed the business, along with long hours, running to stores and trying to find enough employees ever since.

“I’ve had the same job for 14 years. It hasn’t got any easier. I’m not getting any younger,” the 47-year-old said. “I haven’t gotten promoted. I peaked here.”

The restaurant is on the first floor of a building owned by Mike Lang. Efforts to reach Lang were not immediately successful on Wednesday.

But he told The Spokesman-Review last year that it was his intent to sell the building.

“Lauren and I have not gotten along too well, but if I sell” Soulful Soups would be out at that point, he said in February 2024.

Lang also said that he had invested more than $1 million to renovate the upper floors of the building. That includes the third floor, where he resides.

“I’m getting old and tired of the riff-raff,” Lang said last year. “I just want to be in good health and on a beach somewhere.”

Intending to keep her legacy going, D’Arienzo said she had three potential deals to continue Soulful Soups.

The best chance came late last year and the parties were due to sign on Dec. 31. But just days before the signing, Lang increased the lease by $1,200 a month, she said.

“I wanted to set them up for success,” she said. “And, a rent increase of $1,200 was not going to help their bottom line at all.

“We were never able to get an agreement that was reasonable.”

D’Arienzo said she recently learned that Lang has signed an agreement to finally sell the building.

“They went through inspection and it’s getting ready to change hands quickly,” she said. “I’ve seen the new owners walk through. I spoke with them and their broker. They made it clear they were not going to be extending the lease there.”

Thus, the restaurant’s last day fast approaches.

D’Arienzo said she wants her customers to know “that we love them, we hear them and I have done everything in my power, besides signing another lease somewhere else, which would tie me down to doing it for more years.

“I’ve done everything to keep it going. The only reason I have stayed doing it, is for the people. I don’t call them my customers. They are my guests.”

D’Arienzo also owns The St. Bernard, a neighborhood restaurant, at Schweitzer Mountain ski resort. That will continue.

“I am still open to selling (Soulful Soups) and the concept,” she said. “I’m still willing to hold someone’s hand and relocate. But, I need someone who has the drive and the energy to do that. It’s not just about the money at all.”

After next week, D’Arienzo said she’s going to work hard at doing nothing.

“The thought of not answering the phone and racing down when someone calls in sick or running to the store to get more salad is appealing,” she said. “I go from sad and switch to excitement for what is next for me, personally. I’m excited to get bored again so I can get creative.”

She may start a food truck, a business in Sandpoint, or something else.

“It’s not farewell forever,” D’Arienzo said. “I’d like to think (Soulful Soups) is not dead.

“I’d like to think it’s going to take another life of its own, somehow, someway.”