Country Harvest revitalizes King's Table; conversions of older buffet concept escalate as IKT focuses on Country Harvest

Nation's Restaurant News, March 22, 1993 by Alan Liddle

Conversions of older buffet concept escalate as IKT focuses on Country Harvest

BELLEVUE, Wash. -- With post-conversion sales up by more than 50 percent at some units, IKT Management Co. is converting many of its aging King's Table Buffet outlets to a year-old scatter-system concept called Country Harvest Buffet Restaurant.

Underscoring the dramatic turnaround by the once cash-strapped buffet operator since its acquisition in 1991 by Heller International Inc., IKT said it plans to augment its conversion program by building seven new Country Harvest Buffet restaurants this year.

If that goal is realized, the company's Country Harvest division will grow to 23 units, while its King's Table stable will shrink to 40.

An additional 20 Country Harvest restaurants -- 15 new stores and five conversions -- are planned for 1994, the company said.

"It [King's Table] has no future in our portfolio," IKT president Colin H. Naughton explained. "We've got to get out there and build new [Country Harvest] stores."

Before joining IKT, Naughton had served as executive vice president of marketing for PepsiCo and worked for both the Pizza Hut and KFC divisions.

While IKT operates restaurants in eight Western states, its near-term expansion plans will focus on California, Colorado, Oregon and Washington, officials indicated.

Naughton said a couple of years of "trench warfare," during which IKT closed more than 20 King's Table Buffets, has left the company with a profitable "core" of the older restaurants. He said about half of the 43 surviving King's Table outlets will be converted to Country Harvest Buffets, but the others are too small to accommodate the new concept so they will continue operating under the King's Table coat of arms.

Founded in Eugene, Ore., in 1965, King's Table Buffet historically has been a major player among all-you-can-eat chains in the West and reached its zenith in the mid-1980s, when it fielded more than 80 units. The chain's growing pains were aggravated when it was acquired in the late '80s by New York-based Horn & Hardart in a heavily leveraged transaction.

Under Horn & Hardart, the company had not been able to remodel older facilities or grow because debt-service costs were too high, Naughton had said shortly after IKT was acquired by Heller International in 1991.

A subsidiary of Fuji Bank of Tokyo and a participant in the King's Table leveraged buyout, Heller International wound up with IKT when Horn & Hardart defaulted on its loan.

King's Table units are typically about 7,500 square feet, seat 245 people and feature a single cafeteria-style service line, or "chute." Company officials said the decor, while clean and bright, contributes to an "institutional" ambience.

Though the conversions to date are smaller, the Country Harvest Buffet prototype is 10,000 square feet with 350 seats. Under the "scatter" format, salad and other "build-your-own" bars, prepared salads, soups, chilies, stews, casseroles, meats, poultry dishes and desserts are spread over several different hot-or-cold stations at one end of the restaurant.

Wood trim, brass fixtures, colorful tile surfaces, lively wallpaper and carpet patterns and frilly curtains support Country Harvest Buffet's casual country theme and give it a "warmer" ambience than that of its royal cousin.

Enhanced levels of service are also part of the Country Harvest Buffet formula, IKT officials said.

A greeter meets incoming guests at the door to answer questions about prices and service. After customers have paid at one of two registers, seaters show them to the dining area, where they can select and reserve their seats before beginning their trip through the buffet. Buffet area attendants keep the stations neat and well stocked and answer guest questions, while roaming dining room attendants clear dishes between courses and offer refills on beverages.

King's Table Buffet stores generate average annual sales of about $1.2 million, said Robert Galentine, IKT vice president and Country Harvest Buffet chief operating officer. In comparison, he added, the first King's Table unit converted to a Country Harvest Buffet reported 12-month sales of $1.7 million and other larger units in Southern California could report sales of up to $2.2 million in the first year after conversion.

Galentine, a veteran of Red Lobster, Sea Galley Stores, Flakey Jake's and Captain Crab, said Country Harvest Buffet strives to provide "Homestyle food and hospitality at old fashioned prices." That thought is posted on a number of different surfaces, including pocket menus and wall hangings.

Scatter systems, which are becoming popular among buffet operators, give customers more latitude in structuring their meals: They can start at whichever station they like and return as often as they like.

By breaking the traditional service line into numerous service points, scatter systems tend to reduce bottlenecks caused by customer indecision and the restocking of food items. The increased number of shorter lines also leads to less waste because the specter of time-consuming second or third trips through a long line does not frighten guests into overloading their plates initially.