Umami, the contest-born ramen restaurant that opened near downtown Tempe in September 2013, is closing its doors this week.
In its Facebook announcement, the restaurant blamed Mill Avenue’s high costs of doing business:
It’s with a heavy heart that we have to announce that Umami will no longer be open at our current location off of Mill. We are an independent veteran & women owned restaurant and Mill has just become too expensive for us. We are looking for a new location and hope to reopen in the next month or two.
The restaurant, located on Sixth Street just east of Mill, will remain open through Thursday or until it runs out of food, whichever happens first.
Umami was launched when original chefs Jared Lupin and Matt Marlowe won a restaurant-startup contest sponsored by the building’s landlord.
The prize included six months of free rent and public-relations services.
