Everybody needs to go Floyd's Grill for breakast

The Watkinsville City Council passed the beer and wine pouring licenses for the five outstanding restaurants inside the city limits and all of them are maybe three blocks apart on Main Street.

The newest kid on the block is called Mirko's Pasta at 2 S. Main Street and this restaurant could give DePalma's a run for their money as far as fresh pasta and good service. They took over the spot where a Quizno's once was a few weeks back in the Town Center development at 2 South Main Street, Suite 101. The owner is named Mirko Digiacomantonio but a gentleman named Stefano appeared before the city council pleading for new employees only half jokingly. They have been very busy and packed since opening a week ago Friday.

Kenneth Gautreau resubmitted his license application for the Cajun restaurant which bears his name. Anne Miller-Anderson did the same for Maison Bleu. Both lost loved ones who ran their respective restaurants in the last calendar year. Marta Dean appeared for Jose Zambrano and their restaurant Girasoles. Miller-Anderson spoke about how 98% of her upscale customers are glad to find out they are serving beer and wine and you cannot leave or enter the premises with bottles of wine.

Scott Boswell has a slightly different situation at his restaurant Floyd's Grill. First he serves breakfast. Second he has a drive through (although it is slower than molasses). Third they were wanting to serve buckets of beer and were denied. Fourth they want to have neon and given the 1950s decor of the restaurant it would go well, but they have been denied. Boswell's frustrations and obvious loss of great deals of money were on display as he told of giving the high schools hundreds of dollars each and getting nothing in return. He even went so far as to go to the public high schools and ask the kids were they hang out. "Not at your place Mister" was their near unanimous reply.

The solutions are simply but not for Mr. Boswell to digest. He needs to make his place the hip place to hang out, and it is not at this point. I told him he needs to make his place more cool, and the obvious marketing ploys of Facebook, MySpace and their ilk are an easy first step. At least two other Watkinsville businesses I know of are on MySpace that I am aware of: the Glo Salon and Sweet ReTreat are just two of my 2,650 friends or at least they have been asked to be my friend. I lost track of keeping up with it and had to switch my profile to private. I would think that Floyd's Grill could use an extra 2,650 customers for their breakfast.

Council member Brian Brodrick complimented Boswell on this breakfast. They start serving at 7 am and I am afraid I would have to get there about that early to make it to school with Lowell by 8:10 am on weekdays. I do want to try it and may get up that early tomorrow. Y'all come join me. Boswell compared his breakfast to that of Cracker Barrel. I would think more Arnold's on Happy Days.

He needs to saturate Gainesville State College's campus in Watkinsville with coupons or giveaways or whatever. They always like free food there, I know I used to run the bookstore. College students and teachers are underpaid and undernourished. He should sell some food at halftime of the Athens Academy and Westminster football and basketball games. Cater to a different crowd. Get the soccer families. Get some real return on your investment with youth athletics. They have some really cool bandero racers I think Chief Lee O'Dillon called them. Have them drive around the parking lot or whatever is street legal.

Get the skate board kids coming doing their tricks on your curbs. Coolness is created and cultivated, seldom captured by capitalism, but you have to make you place welcoming for kids to create that aura of hipness and being the "it" establishment. All of the other restrauant owners encouraged Boswell is a charming display of camaraderie.

So far as I know his only breakfast restaurant competition round these parts is the Cajun flavored Big Easy, and my son wants to go there every weekend morning. I do not indulge him nearly enough. There is also a trailer that sells ribs on the weekend.

The Big Easy and Krimson Kafe are the only restaurant in Watkinsville proper besides Chicken Express that has no beer and wine license, proving that they get along fine. are the only restaurant owners politely shouted encouragement to Boswell. The First Friday thing with all the classic cars is a step in the right direction. All the businesses stay open late on the first Friday of the month with rock bands and inflatable bouncy moonwalk things and reasons to walk around a small town safely.

Watkinsville will also have a new jewelry line by the name of Emma Laura on display at 2 South Main Street next to Gautreau's coming up from Dublin with Tanner Hoyt selling this lovely product in a fine compliment for the neighboring businesses. Art, jewelry and restaurants are the most visible cogs in the Watkinsville economy.

No increase in DUI since Watkinsville has featured beer and wine pouring licenses in five restaurants, said Police Chief Lee O'Dillon. He also added that several attempts at getting undercover underage beer and wine sales have failed on both a local and state level.

I am proud of my city and my home for rising above the reactionary intolerance as far as this topic of beer and wine being poured in restaurants in our little town.

Comments

dawgfan100 said…
I agree with this Blog. My family has eaten at Floyds Grill and we were not impressed. We support locally but Floyds Grill needs help on several categories, most notably slow service.
Anonymous said…
We really enjoyed Floyds and were sad to see it close. We never had the chance to use the wi-fi or take advantage of the beer sales. We found the food to be good, and reasonably priced, and service was usually quick and friendly for dine-in. We did a call-ahead take-out order once and had no problem. We never tried the drive-thru, as it wasn't open yet the times we tried. I see the point about not really establishing its crowd. I also overheard some of the security screeners at the courthouse complaining about the alcohol sales. Basically, they said "in my day, when you wanted to eat with your family, you didn't go to a place that served beer. If you wanted beer, you went to a beer joint." I wonder if some of the people who would have patronized Floyd's didn't out of protest, and if some of those who would have if they had known there was beer, didn't know.

Either way, we're sorry to see Floyd's go, especially this time of year, when it would be nice to go have a meal on the patio.

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