Walk into Voodoo Brewing Co. on North High Street and you are stepping into one more chapter of the Short North’s habit of turning old retail rooms into places where people actually want to linger. The Pennsylvania-born brewpub chain celebrated its Columbus grand opening on August 2, 2025, according to Columbus food-news writer Nick Dekker’s Breakfast With Nick column and a July 2025 story in 614NOW, and the address you want is 958 N High St. What Now Columbus, summarizing an earlier Columbus Business First report, explained that the project stitches together two former spaces: 958 N High St, previously DeVine Tastings & Dining, and 952 N High St, which had been the Mouton cocktail bar. Breakfast With Nick described the pairing slightly differently, naming Mouton and “the Tastings wine bar,” but every account agrees on the same idea, a double storefront reborn as a single high-foot-traffic brewpub. The same What Now piece said the room would seat roughly one hundred guests and would pour beer alongside cocktails and non-alcoholic drinks, with food running to pizzas, appetizers, burgers, and salads. That is a lot of moving parts for one corner of the neighborhood, and it helps explain why the opening drew attention from local business press long before the doors actually swung wide.
Promotional photo of Voodoo beers on the bar. Photo courtesy of Voodoo Brewery, republished by NEXTpittsburgh.
Why a franchise brewpub feels at home here
Columbus already supports plenty of independent breweries, so a franchised concept with centralized production can read like a different animal on paper. In practice, Voodoo has spent years pitching itself as a quirky brewpub brand rather than a cookie-cutter sports bar, and company leaders have been open in interviews about how the model actually works. Matteo Rachocki told Franchise Times in January 2024 that the company deliberately “took away the brewing element” for franchisees so that beer stays consistent, with everything still made in Meadville, Pennsylvania, and shipped out through the company’s distribution network. That interview also noted seventeen locations across seven states at the time, while 614NOW’s summer 2025 reporting described more than twenty locations nationwide, including other Ohio outposts in Cleveland, Cincinnati, Toledo, and West Chester. Numbers shift as new pubs open, but the through line is the same: Columbus is plugging into a growing network rather than inventing a standalone brand from scratch.
Rachocki’s comments sketch why a franchisee in a competitive drinking city might want the model anyway. The brewing team stays in Meadville, menu development pairs brewing and kitchen leadership, and each shop is allowed a little room for local personality even while sticking to core systems. NEXTpittsburgh’s 2018 coverage of the franchise rollout quoted Chief Operating Officer Jake Voelker saying there is no rigid template for every pub, and the piece highlighted flagship beers such as Voodoo Love Child, Good Vibes IPA, and White Magick of the Sun alongside the colorful, eclectic interiors people associate with the brand. Loud flavor, playful branding, and food that is meant to stand on its own next to the taps are the story the brand keeps telling, and Columbus is getting the same playbook.
The Columbus operator named in multiple reports is Srinivas “Sam” Madhamshetti. What Now Columbus identified him as a real estate agent and owner of several retail and restaurant businesses, the kind of background that can matter when you are retrofitting two Short North addresses into one smooth operation. That local footprint still shapes how the room presents itself, from hiring to how the staff talks about the neighborhood. Untappd lists a “Voodoo Columbus” venue page at the same 958 N High St address, which is a small but useful cross-check that the digital footprint matches what reporters were writing before and after the opening weekend.
Beer, cocktails, and the things Columbus coverage keeps naming
Because the Columbus kitchen does not brew on site, the tap list is really a window into what Meadville is packaging for the week. 614NOW’s pre-opening article highlighted Good Vibes as a West Coast IPA and Voodoo Love Child as a Belgian tripel, matching the flagship language NEXTpittsburgh had already used when profiling the franchise program. Those names show up again and again in fan chatter for a reason: they are the beers the company itself leans on when it tells its story. You should still expect rotations, seasonals, and the occasional one-off event pour, because even a centralized brewery has to keep the tap handles interesting if it wants repeat traffic on High Street.
Beyond beer, What Now’s reporting promised cocktails and non-alcoholic options, and 614NOW reinforced the culinary angle by mentioning dishes such as beer mussels, truffle fries, gochujang wings, and specialty pizzas. That is a wider menu than a bare-bones tasting room would bother with, and it lines up with how Voodoo positions the pubs as full evenings rather than a single round at the bar. If you care about mocktails or NA beer, third-party listings suggest the Columbus team is thinking about that audience as well. Find Me Non-Alcoholic, which explicitly states that its data is verified against Google Places as of September 17, 2025, categorizes the Columbus Voodoo page as a bar with mocktails and NA options alongside the usual craft lineup.
A look at the brand’s visual personality
Company photography published alongside NEXTpittsburgh’s franchise coverage shows long trays of colorful Voodoo beers lined up on a bar rail, which is useful even if the image was not taken in Columbus. It communicates what the franchise wants you to expect from a flight: bold glassware, lots of hues, and a slightly theatrical presentation. A second still from the same article shows the Homestead, Pennsylvania, pub inside a former fire and police station, complete with exposed brick, pinball machines, and chalk art climbing the walls and ceiling. That location is not Ohio, and the caption in the original story is clear about it, yet the photo still illustrates the layered, slightly mischievous aesthetic Voodoo likes to deploy when it remodels an old building. Your Short North room will have its own layout, but the through line is supposed to be recognizable.
Homestead, Pennsylvania Voodoo pub interior inside a former fire and police station. Photo courtesy of Voodoo Brewery, republished by NEXTpittsburgh.
What guests have been saying
Joe Coffee’s location page for Voodoo Brewing Co. in Columbus aggregates several lengthy Google reviews, and they paint a surprisingly specific picture for a place that had only been open a few months when those comments were collected. Multiple reviewers talk about ordering flights when they could not decide on a single beer, and several shout out individual bartenders by first name for cocktails such as espresso martinis and margaritas. Food references bounce from pickle pizza and mac-and-cheese pizzas to wings, truffle fries, egg rolls, and a pretzel with honey dipping sauce that one guest preferred over the usual cheese cup. A few posts mention Indian dishes on the menu alongside classic pub fare, big screens on game days, comedy open mic nights, karaoke, and even an inflatable tube man out front, which is exactly the sort of detail you cannot invent and still sound credible.
None of that replaces walking in yourself, but it does suggest early visitors are treating Voodoo like an entertainment-forward neighborhood hangout rather than a quiet lager-only tasting nook. Several reviews also praise non-alcoholic options, including a non-alcoholic lager that one drinker compared favorably to the real thing, which matters for mixed groups where not everyone wants alcohol. Service speed comes up in both directions, with at least one guest noting a slower stretch during their visit even while they still enjoyed the overall vibe. Reading those comments feels like listening to friends compare notes after a Saturday night, which is usually more informative than polished marketing copy.
Practical details worth writing down
The address is 958 N High St, Columbus, OH 43201, matching What Now Columbus, 614NOW, Breakfast With Nick, Untappd’s venue listing, and Find Me Non-Alcoholic. The phone number repeated on Find Me Non-Alcoholic and the Joe Coffee location page is (614) 564-9469. For hours, third-party directories still disagree slightly, which is normal when a new restaurant is tweaking service. Find Me Non-Alcoholic’s Google-backed listing as of September 17, 2025 shows doors opening at 11:00 a.m. seven days a week, closing at 11:00 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, and staying open until midnight on Friday and Saturday. Joe Coffee’s page, meanwhile, lists Sunday through Thursday service until 10:00 p.m. except for Friday and Saturday stretching to 1:00 a.m. Rather than pick a winner, the safest move is to treat those entries as a reminder to glance at Google Maps or call ahead before you plan a late night.
Parking in the Short North is its usual puzzle of garages, side streets, and patience. The brewpub sits on one of the busiest retail corridors in the city, so if you are visiting on a weekend, budgeting a few extra minutes never hurts. For menu updates and event announcements, start with the official Columbus site at columbus.voodoobrewery.com and double-check hours there or by phone if you are planning a late visit.
Bottom line
Voodoo Brewing Co. in Columbus is a franchise outpost doing what the brand has been practicing for years: ship Meadville-brewed beer to a loud, design-heavy room, back it with a broad food menu and a bar program that hops between cocktails, mocktails, and pints, and let a local operator steer the relationship with the neighborhood. The Short North build-out repurposes two familiar High Street storefronts, the August 2025 grand opening delivered what reporters had been previewing since 2024, and early Google reviews aggregated on Joe Coffee suggest guests are already treating the place like a game-day and weekend-night fixture. We think of it as a carefully engineered brewpub night on North High Street, colorful beer names and a kitchen that expects to share the spotlight with whatever is in your glass.
Sources
Bretz, Amanda. "Voodoo Brewing Coming to Short North This Fall." What Now Columbus. https://whatnow.com/columbus/restaurants/voodoo-brewing-coming-to-short-north-this-fall/ (Accessed April 2026).
Dekker, Nick. "Friday Food Bites: Voodoo Brewing opens in Short North, Hot Chicken Takeover closing in Clintonville." Breakfast With Nick. July 31, 2025. https://breakfastwithnick.com/2025/07/31/voodoo-brewing-opens-hot-chicken-takeover-closing-clintonville/ (Accessed April 2026).
McLaughlin, Jack. "Popular East Coast craft brewery chain opening first Columbus location." 614NOW. July 28, 2025. https://614now.com/2025/food-drink/popular-east-coast-craft-brewery-chain-opening-first-columbus-location (Accessed April 2026).
Glenn, Megan. "Voodoo Brewing CEO Talks Franchise Growth in Era of Independent Craft Breweries." Franchise Times. January 2024. https://www.franchisetimes.com/issue-archive/2024/january/voodoo-brewing-ceo-talks-franchise-growth-in-era-of-independent-craft-breweries/article_c8a91854-9f5a-11ee-83ff-b3a083a7f148.html (Accessed April 2026).
Locklin, Kristy. "Voodoo Brewery launches pub franchising program." NEXTpittsburgh. October 8, 2018. https://nextpittsburgh.com/city-design/voodoo-brewery-launches-pub-franchising-program/ (Accessed April 2026).
Voodoo Brewing Co. (Columbus, OH). Find Me Non-Alcoholic. https://www.findmenonalcoholic.com/oh/columbus/voodoo-brewing-co-columbus-oh (Accessed April 2026).
Voodoo Brewing Co. (Columbus, OH). Joe Coffee. https://joe.coffee/locations/oh/columbus/voodoo-brewing-co-columbus-oh-columbus/ (Accessed April 2026).
Voodoo Columbus. Untappd. https://untappd.com/v/voodoo-columbus/13549829 (Accessed April 2026).