“I know they’re not making any more of it.” And off I was in commercial real estate. An opportunity opened up. I visited a recruiter. He asked, “What do you think about real estate?” About three years later, a requirement came in for restaurant real estate. And I was off to the races. I read that Marriott purchased Big Boy. I loved their strawberry pies. I wrote to Marriott to suggest I could find sites on Long Island for Big Boys. A Tennessee gentleman, Bill Killpatrick, from Marriott, wrote back to me. “We’re not interested in bringing Big Boys to Long Island. But we just bought a chain, Roy Rogers. We would be interested in growing that chain.” It was my start in restaurant site selection. After spending two years finding locations for Roy Rogers, and even having dinner with Roy Rogers himself, Bill Kilpatrick threw me a curve ball.The mayor of Alexandria, VA had called Bill Marriott. They had built a new City Hall. He wanted Marriott to build a restaurant in the old city hall. I was invited to the opening of their first dinner house restaurant. The Joshua Tree. I loved it. I told Mr. Marriott that the concept would work very well in Long Island. “If you can find a good location, we will definitely consider that.” And so began my time in dinner house real estate site selection.Doing deals for a 7,000- 10,000 square-foot restaurant paid four times better than finding a location for a 2,200 square- foot Roy Rogers. Dinner houses were FUN! And the comp meals were a lot better than just a Roy Rogers Roast beef sandwich … even with fries. Read about the next leg of Paul’s career and what he learned in the September edition.
HOSPITALITY NEWS AUGUST | Page 27
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