Joanna Hayes

Joanna Hayes covers the food and beverage economy for Knox News, connecting restaurant openings, closings and trends with the wider business landscape around dining and retail. Her work sits at the intersection of service journalism and growth reporting, showing how places to eat, drink and shop shape the city’s identity and everyday life. She writes frequently about restaurants and retail for the newsroom’s business growth and development team, grounding food stories in the realities of expansion, redevelopment and consumer habits.

Restaurants, retail and the business of dining

Hayes focuses on Knoxville’s food and beverage scene, tracking new concepts, closures and the shifts they signal in the local business environment. Across her coverage she reports on restaurants and retail for the growth and development team, treating dining spots as businesses that drive foot traffic, jobs and neighborhood change rather than just places to eat. Her beat routinely follows major changes on the map, including development pieces such as the proposal for a massive six‑story apartment complex at the former JFG sign site in South Knoxville and what that project could mean for the surrounding area. She also examines how hotels, bars and restaurants contribute to a broader hospitality identity, writing on how these venues collectively make hospitality part of the city’s civic brand. Even when the subject is a single restaurant, she frames it within economic and cultural context, as in her reporting on the local food and beverage scene’s openings, closings and emerging trends.

Service coverage, brackets and guides

A large share of Hayes’ work is practical coverage that helps readers decide where to go and what to order, often with a strong sense of fun. She runs the “Meat Madness” burger bracket, a multi‑story series that invites readers to vote for Knoxville’s best burger, from the opening round through later stages when eight restaurants remain and into a final four showdown. She writes seasonal guides such as her piece highlighting eight restaurants and bars with patio misters designed to keep people cool during a heat wave, blending a weather story with concrete dining options. Her coverage of the Smokies stadium offers another service angle, outlining how fans can build exercise into a game day visit and navigating the stadium environment through the lens of movement and amenities. On the menu side she spotlights eye‑catching offerings, including outrageous mac and cheese and waffle ice cream cones coming to the city, using specific dishes to capture attention while introducing readers to new venues and trends in comfort food and desserts. She also reports on closures, such as the story exploring what the shutdown of The Lunchbox and Fieldhouse Social means for local diners and the growth and development beat, keeping readers current on what disappears as well as what opens.

Profiles, columns and food culture

Beyond guides and brackets, Hayes invests in narrative profiles and columns that show how food is bound up with personal history and identity. Her feature on Sticky Rice Cafe follows the restaurant’s journey from Laos to Knoxville, telling the story through the owner’s refugee experience and how that background shapes the menu and atmosphere. She writes opinion pieces on hospitality and sports, including a column arguing that hotels, bars and restaurants help define the city’s hospitality character, and another describing how a plate of food can seal a college athletic commitment based on her own recruiting experience. These columns extend her beat into memory, aspiration and belonging while remaining grounded in specific meals, venues and the dynamics of the food industry. Hayes also documents moments when local establishments gain national recognition, such as her coverage of a restaurant owner reacting to being named among 44 standout spots by USA TODAY Network food journalists, treating awards as both business milestones and personal validation. In digital video she appears on camera to try viral treats like dot cakes, walking viewers through the dessert trend and adding a sensory, experiential layer to her reporting. Across these formats she presents food as culture, business and story at once, showing how individual plates, patios and dining rooms reflect larger shifts in the community.

Multiplatform beat reporting

Hayes works as a multiplatform reporter, pairing traditional articles with social and video to build a coherent presence around the food and retail beat. Her author page and staff listing position her squarely within Knox News’ coverage of the local business landscape, emphasising her role chronicling openings, closings and trends in restaurants and retail. On Instagram she introduces herself as the restaurant and retail reporter and directs followers to her author page to “get caught up on some of the latest stories” from the growth and development team, using social channels to drive audiences into deeper reporting. Syndicated versions of her work on partner platforms retain this framing, identifying her as a Knox News reporter covering restaurants and retail, which underscores that her food writing is tied to business reporting rather than lifestyle alone. Taken together, her stories, videos and social posts show a beat reporter whose distinct focus is the business and culture of eating and drinking locally, delivered through accessible guides, interactive features, and narrative profiles.