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Meet Ed Doherty, restaurant king(Record, The (Hackensack, NJ) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Sep. 24--Ask Ed Doherty of Saddle River how he became the restaurant king of New Jersey and he'll say "by accident." Then look over his long r?sum? in restaurant and real-estate jobs. It's clear that the growth of Doherty Enterprises of Allendale into a company that operates 80 restaurants in the tri-state area, with more than 6,000 employees, was no accident. Doherty, 61, grew up in Valley Stream, N.Y., working in a deli owned by his mother. After graduating from St. John's University, he gained real-estate experience making gasoline-station deals for Mobil Oil. That led to real-estate manager jobs with Burger King and the Marriott Corp. In 1985, in an effort to find a career that would allow him to live in Ridgewood, where he raised his family, he bought 19 Roy Rogers restaurants in Connecticut from Marriott. He was on the road to restaurant empire building. Doherty Enterprises now operates 56 Applebee's restaurants in New Jersey and Long Island, 19 Panera Bread restaurants in New York, three Chevy's Fresh Mex in New Jersey and Carino's Italian Grill and Shannon Rose Irish Pub, both in Clifton. His company has just signed a deal to open 30 El Pollo Loco fast-food restaurants in New Jersey and Long Island. Two of his three children have joined the family business. His son Tim will oversee the El Pollo Loco rollout and his daughter Shannon is in charge of the Shannon Rose concept. Daughter Kerry is still too young to have fulfilled her father's four-year rule -- four years minimum working for someone else after college. QUESTION: We wanted to talk to you because you're the restaurant king of New Jersey. ANSWER: Well, I don't know about that. I'm in the restaurant business and I'm in New Jersey. Q: Is there anybody who owns more restaurants than you? A: Probably not. Q: So if I go into any Applebee's in North Jersey, it's an Ed Doherty Applebee's A: Yes. We have 38 in northern and central New Jersey and 18 on Long Island. Q: Which of them is your top performer? A: Clifton. It's the top Applebee's of mine and it's the No. 3 Applebee's in the world. Q: Wow! No. 3 in the world? I wonder why? A: The top two Applebee's in the world are in Manhattan -- in Times Square and on 50th Street. Clifton is a strong market. There are a lot of people who live within three to five miles of the Clifton area. Route 3 is a heavily traveled road. There's a lot of industry, there's a lot of shopping and entertainment. For a restaurant to be successful you need lots of people, you need daytime population, which means either shopping or offices, you need nighttime, which is entertainment -- the movie theaters. Q: If you wanted to take 10 or 20 of your Applebee's and convert them to something else, could you? A: Not really. Once you have a concept like Applebee's or Panera Bread, you have the right to a territory as long as you develop so many restaurants per year in that territory. Once I open one, I sign a franchise agreement. Those agreements obligate me and obligate the franchiser to allow me to operate for 20 years with options. So if I wanted to close some Applebee's or Paneras, I would have to have permission from the franchiser. After the 20 years are over, I can do what I want. But if you're successful, you're going to continue. Q: Do you feel as if your destiny is tied to these national companies? A: Yes. But we chose that as our direction for owning and growing a company, rather than just opening Ed's Restaurant over and over. We made the decision that there is a strategic advantage to be involved with the right brands. We got involved with Applebee's because it was the right brand. We got involved with Panera Bread because I'm proud to serve their products. We're getting involved with El Pollo Loco because I'm enamored with the quality of their products. I want people to enjoy the restaurants that we own and operate and come back. Q: Why did you open the Shannon Rose Irish Pub? That's a departure from franchising. A: When we went to Clifton Commons, they had two restaurant pads, so we leased those and put in an Applebee's and a Chevy's franchise. When they expanded the shopping center, they added two more pads, and I didn't want anyone else there so I leased those pads. We opened a concept called Carino's there, so we had Applebee's, we had Mexican, we had Italian and we wanted something to complement them and I said, "Let's do an Irish pub." It opened March 6 of last year and we're going to open a second one in Woodbridge. Q: Do you think people will want to franchise your Shannon Rose concept? A: That's a possibility, but there are too many people in this business that open up one or two restaurants and say, "In five years, we're going to have a hundred or a thousand." I've been around too long. We'll just go slow and see. Q: I was reading the El Pollo Loco franchise requirements and they include, "Must demonstrate ability to open restaurants, negotiate leases." Guess they don't have to worry about that with Doherty Enterprises. A: Our company is very well respected within the industry. We are the 17th-largest franchisee-operated restaurant company in the United States. We just try to deliver a good product to our guests all the time. I created a mission statement which was "Wow" -- wow every guest every time, wow our people, wow our communities, and wow our suppliers. And if we do that, we'll wow our sales and profits. Q: How do you wow your employees? A: If I treat them with dignity and respect and provide a great opportunity for them to have a good job and to grow within their job, then they will wow every guest every time. I want the people that work for me never to want to leave me. Q: Your recipe for success? A: Don't lie, don't steal. And treat everybody the way you want to be treated. If you do that, you've lived a good life. And when you go to The Maker, he'll say, 'You did a good job.' It's so simple. To see more of The Record, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.NorthJersey.com. Copyright (c) 2008, The Record, Hackensack, N.J. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email [email protected], call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. |