Macon Magazine

June/July 2025 | maconmagazine.com 75 NewTown Macon is an independent nonprofit, making Downtown Macon safe, beautiful, fun, affordable, and locally led. Their comprehensive approach to downtown development has resulted in 83% storefront occupancy, 89% loft occupancy, and 1M+ annual event attendance. other up and we want to see how far we can go. But for me, it's where I was born and raised. I spent eight, almost 10 years away from Macon and it eventually pulled me back, as the old saying goes. WHAT MAKES JBA UNIQUE? Honestly, right now, I'm figuring this out. We're six years in almost, and I still feel like I'm learning the business. I feel like this building was a drastic change. It still feels new to me, even though we started in 2019. Currently, I would say we're a college bar, and so we're trying to fill those shoes. We're trying to figure out what that means for us and how to best offer everything to the college crowd, what they want. We still have a great cocktail program. We have the lounge, which focuses on craft cocktails that rotate. We do focus on non-alcoholic drinks and sobriety on Wednesdays. We have crafted mocktails, so you can still get the same experience as you would at a bar, but you don't have to get the alcohol. You know, mocktails aren't just juices thrown together. So that's one thing that sets us apart. We see the need for there to be a non-ABV option. WHAT'S YOUR VISION FOR THE FUTURE OF JBA? Get the bills paid. Now that we own the building, it's about fixing and focusing on the building and making sure that this thing can last. There's a lot of improvements that need to happen here. The roof is a big one that we immediately looked at, and that's a $100,000 job that previously would have been an impossible thought, but now it's a reality. Instead of risking major roof failure, larger problems on the road, we can get things done now and focus on fixing the building for the future. Striking while the iron is hot. HOW DO YOU SEE JBA'S ROLE IN MACON'S DOWNTOWN MUSIC SCENE? Now the DJs pay our bills, 10 o'clock and beyond is kind of allocated to that side of things. We're dipping our toes in the water right now of doing metal shows with doors at six, show at seven, out by 10, so a lot earlier. If these go well, then we'll start doing this more often. Potentially, what it'll look like is on a Friday and Saturday we'll have a live show at six, seven, ending at nine, and then we'll go to our regular DJ night from 10 o'clock to close. That's the idea. We do host a lyric lounge, which is an acoustic original songwriter showcase. I don't want to just sit back and just say that's it. I want to work back into getting into live music, because that was what we were built on, and that's what I want to do. WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE SPOTS IN DOWNTOWN MACON? Macon Bagels, for sure. You've got Macon Bagels, Piedmont Brewery and Kitchen, and I go to Macon Water Ice all the time. Those are my three lunch spots right next to me. I've got to shout out to Fresh Produce Records for being music-related. Oliver's for dinner is great. You can have Dovetail for upscale, fine dining. That might be my wife's choice, when we do that once every six months. I love The (Humming)Bird. The Bird is great. I love the people that work there. I used to throw darts all the time. It was like a second home for me. If I wasn't here [at JBA], I was across the street. There's no rivalry or hatred, it's very much friends. If I'm not at home, I'm in one of those places. Let JBA host your party, show, or event at Downtown Macon's largest bar. Contact Brandon at jbamacon.com to learn more.

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