In an extraordinarily difficult year for restaurants, the owners of the Chattanooga-area Buddy’s bar-b-q franchise are opening a third location this weekend and betting on the local market.
“We feel very confident that this season will pass, and we feel very confident in continuing investing, especially in the Chattanooga market,” said Darik Dawes, a managing partner in the local franchise group. “We feel we’ll come out of this sooner than most cities.”
The Buddy’s bar-b-q location opening Sunday is part of a new commercial complex in Hixson near Northgate Mall. In August 2019, Dawes and his business partners opened the area’s first Buddy’s bar-b-q in East Ridge, followed by a second area location in Cleveland, Tennessee, in November 2019.
Buddy’s was established in 1972 in Knoxville, and the restaurant has 19 locations across East Tennessee. Each restaurant employs 20 to 25 people, though they normally have about 30 on staff, Dawes said. Business has been off about 30% from what he’d expect in a normal year, but drive-thru, online ordering, delivery and outdoor dining have all helped the restaurant, he said.
“It’s been challenging, but it’s the hand we were dealt,” Dawes said. “Our main focus is to keep our employees safe and to keep our customers safe.”
Photography contributed by Buddy’s bar-b-q / The Buddy’s bar-b-q in East Ridge that opened in August 2019 was the second Chattanooga-area location for the Knoxville-based franchise.Kim Adkins, also a partner in the local franchise, said family-style meals to go have been popular at Buddy’s as people have moved to working and schooling from home.
“Mom and dad are juggling working remotely and kids’ schooling and folks still need to eat,” Adkins said. “This year has been an adventure and also proven we’ve been able to adapt and adjust and continue to operate in a way that makes everyone feel comfortable.”
Dawes and his wife Deanne are also business partners with Adkins and her husband Greg in a SpringHill Suites in Ooltewah, and in a new Hilton Homewood Suites in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, that opened in October. Dawes’s family has owned MainStay Suites near Hamilton Place mall for 17 years.
Being in the restaurant and hotel industries has been tough during the pandemic, but mid-sized markets are resilient, and Chattanooga in particular has been somewhat more stable than other markets, Dawes said.
“I’m hoping by June of 2021 that with the vaccinations and everything that’s happening, that at some point we’ll get to some type of normalcy,” he said. “I don’t know what that looks like, but I know people will want to get out and travel and dine out again.”
Other partners in the local Buddy’s franchise are Ken Maples and Allen Newton, and the group has worked together to stay focused on planning for better times, Dawes said.
“My whole group is an optimistic group – we’ve got to move forward, and that’s what we’ve done,” he said.
Contact Mary Fortune at mfortune@timesfreepress.com. Follow her on Twitter at @maryfortune.
Staff file photo by Dave Flessner / Buddy’s bar-b-q franchise owner Darik Dawes talks about the new restaurant in East Ridge in October 2019.