Lincoln's Royal Grove gets a couple of new owners

Following an upcoming performance on Saturday by Josey Scott, the Lincoln music venue that's in its 90th year of operation will close for a month to complete its renovation.

"We didn't do any major changes," said the 26-year-old Grigorescu. "We pretty much cleaned up a lot of stuff and made it a lot nicer. But I think the way it looks is going to be a surprise for everybody."

In June, the couple was approached by Eli Mardock, the Royal Grove's previous owner, asking if they were interested in buying the nightclub.

"It was all pretty spontaneous," Grigorescu said.

And that put the wheels in motion, Rowell said. Two weeks later, they signed their name to a bill of sale. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"We talked about it for two or three days," Grigorescu said. "We thought it was a really good opportunity. And we wanted to act really fast so we could start the transition and get the renovations and modifications done that we want to do in order to open in the fall."

On Monday, the Royal Grove, at 340 W. Cornhusker Highway, passed its fire inspection and got approval from the Lincoln City Council for a new liquor license in Rowell's name. 

It's all happening quickly, but then again, that's the way life has been since Grigorescu, known simply as Grig, arrived in Nebraska from Romania in 2016.

He came to America with hopes of becoming a collegiate tennis star and by all accounts, he did pretty well.

He was the top singles player at the University of Nebraska at Omaha for much of his career and was the conference player of the week a couple of times.

Still, it was his side hustle — DJing whenever and wherever he could — that has proven to be his calling.

It led to him starting his own music production company that included a record label. In six years in the industry, his production company has garnered more than 60 million streams, while working throughout the region — and frequently at the Royal Grove.

That's how he was approached by Mardock.

After thinking about it, choosing to buy the storied Lincoln club wasn't really much of a decision.

"My family has a lot of business owners and I've definitely had the mentality of always wanting to own my own business," said Rowell, the 21-year-old Omaha native. "The mentality is definitely there to make this business a success."

About a month in, she has quickly found that ownership, while rewarding, is not at all inexpensive.

"The electricity bill is insane," Rowell said. "I mean, the really boring gritty stuff is the most expensive to fix."