Chickie's and Pete's adds Philly Live, Airport, burb sites
The slump is a good time to expand, says boss Pete Ciarrocchia
Chickie's and Pete's adds Philly Live, Airport, burb sites
Joseph N. DiStefano
Chickie's and Pete's, the Philadelphia-based restaurant chain whose anchor store at 16th and Packer is popular with the stadium crowd, plans a new site at the Philly Live development at the demolished Spectrum next Spring, and is hiring 60 to 100 people - "hostesses, runners, cooks" - for each one of its three new locations, to open in mid-October while the NFL is in full swing, owner Pete Ciarrocchi told me.
He's taking over the closed 99 Restaurants locations in Audubon (near Valley Forge) and in Warrington, plus a brand-new location in the mall between Terminals D and C at Philadelphia International Airport. "As soon as you come through security, we'll be on the right," Ciarrocchi said. Isn't this a tough time to open? "It's easier to grow because of the economy," Ciarrocchi told me. There's "more good employees" looking for work, and "there are more stores that didn't make it but have great equipment that you can adapt." Plus, "real estate prices are down," though "construction costs are as expensive as ever." What about financing? "We self-finance a lot," but have also raised cash from locally-based Firstrust (whose boss and owner, Richard Green, is also a part-owner of the Eagles) and from TD Bank (successor to Commerce), which, like Firstrust, "has a hierarchy that isn't just corporate guys but local decision making," Ciarrocchi told me. By contrast, "a lot of the other banks are scared to lend. They made so many bad investments." The openings will give Chickie's 12 freestanding Crab House and Sports Bar locations (and a total of 37 sales sites if you include multiple locations at the Linc and other venues).
Earlier: The same week mobile-phone users mobbed an ESPN sports TV network poll to name Chickie's and Pete's flagship 15th and Packer location (near the stadiums) as "Winning Bar" in a best US sports-bar poll (as my colleague Michael Klein noted here), Pete Ciarrocchi, founder of the Philly-based chain, has named three new sites for the the chain's Crab House and Sports Bar restaurants.
I remember Pete telling Eskin one day that the inclement weather was keeping customers away, hurting his business. Alot of his food(crabs mostly) has to stay fresh, 4 or 5 days of rain in a row costs him to trash thousands of crabs. Eskin says can't you donate it to a food bank or the homeless? pete insincerely imo says "uhhh yeah I do" but its trash to me.Ughh I dont think this guy gets the big picture at all. The word self-absorbed comes to mind.
Maybe hes a great guy but thats not the impression I got the few times I have heard him speak.
Heres one dude who never has or will spend a penny in Chickie + Petes.
— joe smith- 1) Please takeover the 99 location in Deptford NJ. Prime spot
2) The managers at the big stadium location are already telling people they are the featured 3,000 person, largest bar in US spot at Philly Live. Scoop— OnTheBandwagon - Joe Smith.. so you won't eat there because he won't donate expired seafood to a food bank? #1 that makes no sense, #2 is there anything worse for a human to eat than an expired shellfish?— Freddy
- How's that $17 price tag for crab fries working for you on the Wildwood boardwalk?— herbie
Comment removed.- I agree with Philly.thompson chickie and petes is an average place with average food. And I hate to break it to everyone but their crab fries are nasty— cuso20
- Winning sports bar? The last time I went to Chickie's and Pete's was 4/12/09. Chan Ho Park was starting for the Phillies against the Rockies, and I went there to watch before the Flyers game. Except they weren't on.
I asked several waitresses several times to please put on the Phillies game, but all they could say was that the bosses were up in a meeting and that we'd have to wait for them to finish. The Marlins were playing the Mets on a few TVs and the rest were displaying sitcom reruns on TBS. What a great sports bar!!— Not a Fan - Impartial observation (I haven't been to C&P yet): gotta chuckle at the hater's comments, lol. Their places must be good if so many people want to knock them off the pedestal. Looking forward to checking it out now!— HokieMon
- "Their places must be good if so many people want to knock them off the pedestal."
Wrong. Philly people are creatures of habit. They continue to go to the same places they've always gone to. They're afraid of change. Poeple hear the name Chickie's and Pete's and they assume that it's the best because everyone knows of it. The food is average, the places are overhyped. A very underwhelming experience everytime. Plus, too many goons on game days/nights.— taxmannncometh
