Last year, Tommy Truong moved from Las Vegas to Northwest Montana to help his brother and sister-in-law expand their successful Asian takeout restaurant in downtown Columbia Falls to new communities across the state. Opening restaurants was in his blood after working for a Korean barbecue chain, helping launch new locations nationwide and managing the operations at the company’s Las Vegas locations.
But sometimes plans change, and that’s exactly what happened when an old bar across the street was put up for sale. While the Truong family wanted to open a second Asian takeout spot, doing so directly across the street didn’t make sense. So, they decided to do something different, and the result is Columbia Falls’ newest breakfast-and-lunch spot, Columbia Cafe, which opened in January and is quickly becoming a local favorite.
“We wanted to open a place for locals,” Tommy said. “And we wanted to offer some things that you can’t usually get around here.”
Tommy’s brother and sister-in-law, Johnny and Judy, moved to Northwest Montana about 10 years ago, seeking a calmer, slower pace of life than they had in Las Vegas. They initially worked at local nail salons while looking for a community where they wanted to put down roots. Eventually, they chose Columbia Falls and opened Posh Nails and Spa on the north end of Nucleus Avenue in November 2020. The business was an instant success. A few years later, the family decided to expand by opening a restaurant. When a space became available in a recently renovated building just down the street, Johnny, who knows Asian food well, decided on a fast-casual Asian and Japanese restaurant called Teriyaki Kitchen.
Over the past few years, the restaurant had achieved success similar to the salon’s, and the family started exploring ways to duplicate that success elsewhere. In fact, when Flathead Living visited on a recent Friday morning, Johnny and Judy were out of town working on Posh Nails’ new location in Bozeman. That left Tommy holding down the fort in Columbia Falls.
Tommy came up to Montana last summer to help run the restaurant and possibly open a new one elsewhere. But shortly after, the old Columbia Bar was put up for sale, and the idea of opening another Asian takeout spot was put on the shelf — at least for now.
The Columbia Bar has been a fixture of downtown Columbia Falls for decades. The building itself is over 100 years old and once served as both a dance hall and a Chinese restaurant. In 1965, the Finberg family bought it and operated the Columbia Bar for nearly 60 years. While the bar was a bit rough around the edges — in many ways it was the embodiment of a classic “dive bar” — it was loved by locals and, in recent years, gained a following for its popular “Taco Tuesdays” led by bartender Mike Scallen.
In 2023, the bar was sold to a local developer, who kept it open for another year before deciding to close it in the fall of 2024. The storefront sat empty for months, and rumors began to swirl around town about its future. But behind the scenes, the Truong family started to look into the building and saw it as a good opportunity to expand, although with a different concept than their first restaurant. In mid-2025, the family purchased it and decided to open a new breakfast and lunch spot called Columbia Cafe.
Of course, running a restaurant isn’t cheap or easy. To save a few bucks, the family decided to remodel the space themselves. Since it had been years since the previous business was updated, it was very much a rip-it-down-to-the-studs kind of rebuild, Tommy said.
“We did all of the remodeling work ourselves, and that’s probably why it took so long for us to open,” Tommy said, laughing.
As the months went on, locals who frequented downtown started to wonder what was going on at the old Columbia Bar. Just when is that place going to open, many thought. But late in the year, a fresh sign went up front and the windows, which had been blocked for months, revealed a fresh look inside. Finally, in January of this year, the new Columbia Cafe opened for business.
Open six days a week (soon to be seven days as of this writing in late February), the restaurant offers both breakfast and lunch from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tommy said they eventually would like to offer dinner, too, but want to get their breakfast and lunch items nailed down first.
The breakfast menu includes a variety of favorites, like chicken fried steak, huevos rancheros, and waffles, plus a trio of benedicts (a traditional benny, a south of the border benny, and a California benny). Tommy said he went around town trying some of the other breakfast offerings and wanted to create a menu that was different from the rest, emphasizing that it’s usually pretty tough to get an eggs Benedict or waffle in Columbia Falls.
The lunch menu is anchored by a number of signature items, including a burger, a patty melt, a curry chicken salad wrap, and a corned beef and Swiss sandwich. French fries (regular and sweet potato) can be added as sides.
Tommy said that while Teriyaki Kitchen is especially popular for visitors — folks looking for a quick bite after a long day in Glacier National Park — Columbia Cafe is aimed at the local crowd. Quality food, big portions and great service are all hallmarks of the operation, Tommy said.
“We want to make sure that our customers really feel like they’re being taken care of,” Tommy said. “That’s the nature of a full-service restaurant.”
After being open for a few years, Teriyaki Kitchen has become a smooth-running operation, Tommy said. While lunch and dinner hours can be busy, it’s not a hectic place. The same can’t be said for across the street at Columbia Cafe, where the nature of a full-service kitchen and restaurant asks more of its staff to get things done. But so far, Tommy said he’s loving the challenge and the pace.
“I just love how many moving pieces a place like this has,” he said. “I love how much action there is. There’s just no time to be bored here!”
Columbia Cafe, located at 509 Nucleus Avenue in downtown Columbia Falls, is open daily from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., for both dine-in and take-out. To see the menu or learn more, visit www.columbiacafemt.com or call (406) 897-8200.
