There is a new business at the site of the old Patrizios in the Everybody's shopping center. The owners of the local Dairy Queen, Kim and David Minton, acquired the store location in June of 2015 and opened the new restaurant, "the Tidemark Grill" in November of 2015. The Tidemark Grill is open from 4pm to 9pm on Monday through Friday and from 11:30am to 9pm on Saturday and Sunday.
Owner Kim Minton sat down for an interview with the Willapa Harbor Herald, first discussing the difficulty of the opening of the new business. Minton determined that it was the dough of the pizza that was the hardest to decide on, "It was more of a task than I thought it was going to be to figure out what we wanted to offer and especially the pizza. The pizza was the hardest and deciding the type of dough that we liked and what it tasted like. What I've found is that the favorite type of pizza is different with every single person," said Minton, who then settled by saying that you just can't please everyone.
The Tidemark Grill is a fast-casual family dining restaurant and serves primarily pizza, but also does burgers, sandwiches and salads as well as beer. The "fast-casual" status means that instead of first sitting down and then ordering your food, you would order your food while waiting for a table. "We've tried using servers and it's been difficult and sometimes it's tough to judge what certain customer's expectations are; sometimes we've felt like we're rushing people and felt a little pushy where as other customers can be in a rush and thinking that you're being slow," said Minton, adding that the fast-casual system would rid the restaurant of these issues.
When asked about the challenges that opening the new business has presented, Minton responded by first saying that there is quite a difference between running the Dairy Queen and running the new Tidemark Grill, but that there is some experience from running the Dariy Queen that has lent itself to opening the new business. "When we acquired DQ, it was running the day before we got it and was running the day after and with the Tidemark Grill it has been more from scratch starting up," said Minton. A big factor that the Mintons have had experience with would be ordering the food from food suppliers, "having a history with suppliers was very nice. If I hadn't already had relationships with vendors it would've been a huge challenge, before I had DQ I never even knew what any of the big food suppliers were called. So that was a huge advantage as well as knowing what's available."
Minton sited another big difference between the Dairy Queen and the Tidemark Grill is with the Dairy Queen, the restaurant belongs to the larger corporate label, and the menu is mandated, but with the Tidemark Grill the Mintons are free to serve what they please. Since the menu at the Dairy Queen is mandated, there are some local items that have come off of the menu that people always ask about, "It's been six years since the menu was mandated and people still ask like they'd just had the item just the other day," said Minton. These items have all found their way onto the menu at the Tidemark Grill.
Stop into the new Tidemark Grill at Everybody's Grocery next to Las Maracas and check out their menu as well as their selection of beer.