Wright's Barbecue

Central Arkansas fans of Wright’s Barbecue will no longer have to travel to Johnson, Bentonville, or Rogers to enjoy some of Arkansas’ best barbecue. On Oct. 21, Jordan Wright, owner, operator, Little Rock native, and namesake of Wright’s, closed on a property in Little Rock’s Riverdale neighborhood. This will be Wright’s fourth location and first outside of Northwest Arkansas.

Wright’s new digs will be located at 1311 Rebsamen Park Road in the Quonset hut behind Town Pump and Rebsamen Liquor. The large open space is ideal for a Wright’s Barbecue location given its fierce customer loyalty and knack for attracting long lines. The current building will undergo a full renovation, slated to begin in the coming weeks, with seating to accommodate 80-90 customers. All the meat will be smoked on-premises via five Moberg Smokers, which are in delivery. Wright hopes to be open by the late first quarter or early second quarter of 2023.

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I recently caught up with Wright and asked why he chose Little Rock for his next venture:

“It’s a great city. It’s where I grew up, it’s the state capital, and I’ve got a ton of family and friends around Central Arkansas. I’m excited to get back and spend more time down here and invest in the community that is Little Rock. We’ve got great people who are set to come down and run the store that have Little Rock connections. We’re really excited about the building space, about the Riverdale area, and really about everything that Little Rock has going on for it right now.”

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Wright started Wright’s Barbecue in Fayetteville as a food truck in 2016. I met Wright sometime around then when I was a student at the University of Arkansas, following his rolling barbecue stand all around town from Joyce Avenue to the Fayetteville Farmers Market and all points in between. Being a native Central Texan myself, Wright’s little food truck was the only place I could find a properly prepared plate of brisket in my newly adopted state.

Wright's Barbecue

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“It’s really just getting back to the roots, about planting our flag in my home city. What we’ve seen in Northwest Arkansas is each city we’ve opened up in we can create a huge amount of jobs. We can build those relationships within the community to serve customers and have team members that want to serve their community and be able to give back. It’s truly an awesome privilege.”

Wright was born and raised in Little Rock and graduated from Central Arkansas Christian High School in 2004. Soon after, he was off to Fayetteville, where he graduated from the University of Arkansas. A late bloomer to barbecue, he was making a comfortable salary as a wholesale food representative at Tyson when he decided to open the food truck. It wasn’t long before Wright attracted a devout following that caused him to outgrow his little food trailer. In 2018 he bought the old Golden Kolache on Main Street in Johnson and, after a brief remodel, transformed it into one of NWA’s hottest dining destinations. He opened a second location in Bentonville in 2020 and earlier this year a third in Rogers.

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Wright's Barbecue
Wright after feeding hungry Razorback basketball fans in January 2020.

Wright’s rise to the top as possibly Arkansas’s best barbecue joint is in part due to the fact that he was the first to offer a relatively unique product in Arkansas: brisket slow smoked with oak wood. But it’s not just the product itself — he’s damn good at making it. He’s even attracted publicity from Daniel Vaughn, Texas Monthly’s barbecue editor, who traveled up to Northwest Arkansas back in October 2019 to write a feature about his barbecue. In this feature, Vaughn claims the brisket at Wright’s to be “the best brisket I’ve ever found in Arkansas,” which is pretty high praise coming from the brisket authority of Texas. Despite the praise and continued success, Wright remains humble.

“The only thing that matters is the next meal,” Wright said. That’s the only thing we’re focused on. Doesn’t matter what we did in Johnson, doesn’t matter what we’ve done anywhere else — the only thing we’re ever focused on is cooking the next meal to serve to our customers. We’ve got that level of focus going into every cook. We’re just excited to be able to show that type of constant improvement that makes an excellent barbecue experience. It’s a real privilege to be able to share that with Little Rock.”

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