Daily Grill sees silver lining in 'turnaway' woes

Nation's Restaurant News, Oct 7, 1991 by Richard Martin

Following Daily Grill's April expansion to Encino, the chain is scheduled to open another San Fernando Valley unit, in Studio City, by next summer. Spivak said he, Shapiro and Weinstock are "diligently" seeking space in Pasadena for the next location in the Los Angeles area.

Making expansion easier, Spivak said, is the fact that developers of a new breed of smaller, regional malls are eschewing department stores as anchor tenants in favor of restaurant concepts that are proven traffic-generators. For popular chains like Daily Grill and California Pizza Kitchen -- which keep turning up as mall neighbors in L.A.-area developments -- the anchor role can translate into substantial start-up savings.

In the competition between two rival malls in Encino, for instance, the 4,000-square-foot Daily Grill was finally granted $200-a-foot improvement allowances worth $800,000 toward its opening costs of about $1.2 million. A restaurant vehicle without proven drawing powers "would be lucky to get $50 a foot," Spivak said.

Minneapolis, Seattle and Chicago are the first out-of-state markets Daily Grill intends to tap if discussions with seasoned operators in those cities come top fruition. "This is not a franchise situation at all," Spivak explained. "What we need are operators who can be our partners" in joint ventures.

Spivak said the successful launch of the Newport Beach branch erased " trepidations" he and his partners felt about Daily Grill's commercial viability outside of neighborhoods familiar with The Grill's reputation. Nevertheless, he added, "well continue our expansion in a very conservative manner."