Customers come to dine at the historic Warehouse District's Blue Point Grille expecting quality and rarely leave disappointed — exactly how restaurateur George Schindler always envisioned it.
"We do whatever it takes to make guests leave with a smile on their faces," he says one afternoon amid the lunchtime rush. "And that's understood within our company."
On any given weekday, customers fill the trendy dining room early in the lunch hour but stay well past 1 o'clock. All afternoon the space is crowded with table talk and the busy sounds of plates and glasses on the move, while attentive servers weave between tables full of well-fed patrons.
Tonight, the scene will be much the same. The dinner crowd files in early and stays late, eager to enjoy what has been labeled on numerous occasions the area's best seafood.
"We're interested in people coming back, so everything we do keeps that in mind," says Sam Lindsley, Blue Point's general manager. "And that attitude comes directly from the partners. Their personalities are instilled and ingrained into the culture of the company."
That philosophy not only stands behind Blue Point's success, but also is responsible for a string of the area's most popular dining hot spots. Since forming Hospitality Restaurants (HR) in 1991, Schindler and his partners, Kay Ameen and Dave Hale, have kept a firm hold on quality dining in Northeast Ohio. In the wake of such hits as Cabin Club, Salmon Dave's Pacific Grille, Blue Point and Delmonico's Steak House, the three friends have become the local restaurant industry's perennial champs, attracting local awards and national attention in the process.
Blue Point alone has earned rave reviews from The New York Times, was recently voted most popular restaurant by the renowned Zagat Survey and is a longtime fixture on Cleveland Magazine's Best of Cleveland list.
But the men behind HR measure their success in other ways as well.
"I would say that our biggest success no doubt would be the enduring respect we've had for one another over the years as business partners and to have kept our friendship," says Schindler, HR's president. "My business is really about my partnership with my two very good friends."
But that business is not fueled by friendship alone. Since the Cabin Club, the partners have followed a specific plan that aims to control costs without sacrificing quality. With this vision, the three men have been able to steer their properties through the difficulties of a hard market, while never wavering from their idea of how a quality restaurant should be run.
Along with the downtown bar, Thirsty Parrot, the company's four restaurants hope to do more than $15 million in business in 2008. But what is extraordinary is that HR has secured these numbers at an extremely challenging time in the business.
"The industry is more difficult today than it has ever been," Schindler says. Citing the rising associated costs of labor and governmental regulations, Schindler paints a grim picture for restaurant owners. But by sticking to their original business model, the trio behind HR have not only maintained profitability and prestige, but also have positioned their company to take the business to the next level.
Schindler got his first taste of the industry while tending bar in college. After graduating from Bowling Green State University in 1972, he traveled the country opening restaurants with the national chain Victoria Station. But when family reasons landed the native Clevelander back home, Schindler decided he was ready to open his own place.
In 1981, he opened By George! in Fairview Park. The bar quickly became a popular nightspot. But after 10 years of the tiresome hours a bar owner endures and with a family on the way, Schindler decided to change directions.
At the time, he began bouncing possibilities off Ameen, a longtime friend and business broker. The more the two talked, the closer they came to the realization they had always avoided. "We soon made a decision to do something we talked about never doing for fear it might jeopardize our friendship, and that's becoming business partners."
As the pair hammered out the details of their joint venture, Schindler and Ameen, CEO and CFO of Hospitality Restaurants, realized they needed a third partner to round out the business plan. "We needed somebody that knew actually how to run a restaurant and knew how to run the backhouse, the kitchen aspect — and that was Dave."
Schindler first met Dave Hale when both worked for Victoria Station. Hale, now vice president of operations for Hospitality Restaurants, was eager to take a leap of faith and join Schindler and Ameen. From there, HR was born.
Together the trio carefully sketched a plan that went far beyond a single restaurant. "When we started out we had a vision: We were going to open four independent restaurants. Our game plan was to find four existing businesses that had been run down, closed, poorly operated, perhaps, and take them over and completely recreate them," Schindler says.
As opposed to designing a concept and then searching for a location, the first priority was an affordable property. "We looked for a very solid business opportunity, a good location and a good deal. Then the process was to find a niche in the marketplace and create a concept that would work in that location," Schindler explains. "We were small-business people [without] a huge budget, and we felt if we could keep our facility cost down to a minimum, then what we could do is offer a lot of value on the center of the plate."
The partners believed by saving on a monthly cost, the restaurant would be more adaptable. "If you keep your facility cost to a minimum, you have a lot more flexibility in your operation, in how you allow your restaurant to evolve as trends change," Schindler says.
An affordable property was found in Westlake, and in 1991 the Cabin Club opened to immediate success. Without breaking stride, the partners began planning their next move, and Rocky River's Salmon Dave's followed in 1993. But for their third property, the three men put their business philosophy to the test. In the late ‘90s, the Warehouse District was only beginning to show slight signs of revitalization, and many considered it a gamble to invest serious money in the area. But they took the chance, and Blue Point's successful opening in 1998 signaled a turning point for both the area and HR. For Schindler in particular, however, it confirmed the company's approach had worked.
"My partner Kay (Ameen) always says there are a lot of different ways to get to the same bottom line," Schindler explains. "You can dissect your financials every month, and you can look at your linen cost, the cost of seafood and meat, dairy and liquor, and you can cut a lot of costs, but the one thing you're never going to cut is the cost of that original contract you signed. You're either paying the landlord or putting it on the plate. And our choice was always to control our property cost and have more control over our product and labor cost."
By the time HR opened its fourth restaurant, the company had become synonymous with quality dining. Even miles of frustrating construction along Rockside Road couldn't keep patrons from dining at Delmonico's, which opened in Independence in 2004.
In order to run a number of successful restaurants at once, the partners have had to put trust in the staffs at each property. "I've always been a hands-on kind of guy," Schindler says. "And for us to grow this company, we've had to learn to take our hands off the operations to some degree and allow people to express their own style into our business, while staying within the conceptual constraints of how we run it."
HR created various systems throughout their holdings to maintain excellence on all levels. One such system requires restaurant managers to work 48 hours over five days a week, a schedule the partners believe allows employees to effectively do their job, but also encourages a personal life. "It allows them to recharge their batteries," Schindler says. "Our managers are fresh and they want to be at work. Years ago it was standard in this industry that people just got worked to death."
As a result, HR is known as one of the leading employers in the area. In their 16 years of business, the partners are proud to say they've never lost an employee to a lateral position at another local restaurant.
"I have 27 years in the restaurant business, and I can say without hesitation it's the best locally owned restaurant business in Cleveland," Blue Point's Lindsley says. "We've got a good corporate structure that allows the restaurants to grow and evolve in a positive way." By trusting employees with responsibility, HR has created a work force loyal to the success of the business, Lindsley says. "This company invests a lot in people to the point where you want to stay."
Today, with four top restaurants and a successful bar, the three friends have set their sights on the next step. "Part of our plan was to, perhaps, take one concept to market, to replicate it and do numerous properties," Schindler adds. "And we are cautiously and guardedly working on that project as we speak."
But whatever that next step may be, Schindler and his partners vow never to lapse from the quality for which they have become known. "We've never let it go to our heads," he says. "We've always had the attitude the wolf is always at the door and we'd better be better tomorrow. I think our company strives to do that on a regular basis."
(
swenson@inside-business.com)