Four Sons now Charley’s, hosting McDaniel

When Shon Searcy was 17, he told his friends he would own the Four Sons one day. They laughed.

“I was joking, and I didn’t think it would seriously happen,” the Brantley native said.

“I’ve always wanted to own a business and it kinda fell in my lap.”

As for why he actually purchased the bar, the answer is simple.

“I just like to drink beer, so why not own a bar?” Searcy joked.

Searcy purchased the bar in March of this year and named it after his late father, dubbing it “Charley’s Place.”

Purchasing it was only a small piece of the battle because the former Four Sons was in a rough spot.

Searcy spent March until early December renovating the entire bar, investing approximately $180,000 in renovations.

“We totally gutted everything. Everything has been replaced- the bar, the walls, added a handicap bathroom. The stage is bigger, and we basically redid the entire ventilation,” he said.

“That’s where most of our money went.”

A lot of people went into making the bar what it is now, Searcy said.

“I had a small team; Bill Marler, Jeanette Carnley, Scott (Skeet) Dorsey and my bartender,Alaina Warler,” he said.

For people who’d seen the bar before renovations it’s a real shock, Searcy said.

“We made it bigger. We made the ceilings higher and vaulted,” he said.“It’s a really big difference.”

The bar opened the weekend of Dec. 14.

“Our opening week we had good business, we haven’t been advertising much,” Searcy said.

He said about 45 people visited the bar.

“But last weekend we had double that, and this weekend is supposed to be a large crowd,” Searcy said. “We are hoping to go to our maximum capacity of 268.”

Searcy said that his bar is a completely different look and feel from the former Four Sons.

“I think we’re unique as a bar goes. I have a bartender with 15 years of experience serving up drinks that people love,” he said.

The bar doesn’t admit anyone under the age of 21.

“I made it that way to just keep out any minors who are going to drink regardless,” Searcy said. “I was 18 once, too. I know what minors do.”

Searcy’s main goal with Charley’s Place is to make Opp what it once used to be.

“I want to make Opp great again. I want this to be the spot people come to for drinking,” he said. “I remember being younger and coming to Opp just to go to Four Sons, I want it that way again.”

The bar is still a work in progress and Searcy plans to continue adding to it.

“I have big plans for Charley’s Place. I want to pave the parking lot sometime next year,” he said. “Next year, we should have our own shuttle service as well.”

The shuttle service would pick-up and drop-off people from the Opp area to prevent drunk driving.

“I’ve never done anything like owning a bar. So, it’s all a new experience to me still,” Searcy said.

Charley’s Place is only open Thursdays-Saturdays.

Thursday they’re open from 5 p.m. to 12 a.m., the cover is free.

On Fridays they’re open from 7 p.m. until the last person leaves, the cover is $5.

On Saturdays they’re open from 7 p.m. until 2 a.m., the cover is $5.

The Martin McDaniel band will perform this weekend, and the cover will be $10.