From the Windsor Star, September 25, 1979. Located at 7605 Tecumseh Road East, in the Pickwick Plaza. A look at the plaza today shows the Wendy’s as being at that address in Pickwick Plaza, just east of Lauzon Parkway. The restaurant couldn’t have been around very long. Does anyone remember the place? I grew up in the Walkerville area, and didn’t spend much time on the east side, I think it may have been gone by the time I came to Windsor in 1989…
- Windsor‘s first pancake house is open for business.
And the already busy Smitty‘s, at 7605 Tecumseh Rd. E. – in the Pickwick Place shopping plaza – plans to stay a long time.
Maria Maziak, one of the owners of the business, is a warm and enthusiastic promoter for it.
“Starting a place like this has long been a dream of mine,” she said, “but it`s been busy setting it up, getting staff, training them and opening the restaurant. “
As any restaurant patron knows, staff can make a place –or break it.
“Our waitresses are attractively uniformed.” Maria said.
“We want them to be proud to be waitresses.
“When they were interviewed for the job, I told them that if they weren’t proud of being waitresses here, to leave then.
“l think pride is very important to staff,” she added. “We co-operate with our staff and want a good relationship to continue.”
Her partner, Lew Jones, also stressed choice of staff and training.
‘We’ve been very selective.” he said. I’m sure it will pay off by helping the restaurant develop and keep the business it should.”
Smitty’s is a member of a Canadian chain with headquarters in Calgary. Through the head office, it receives certain supplies, recipes for pancakes and standards for quality control, but the business itself is owned by Maria and Lew.
Pancakes occupy the star place on the colorful menus For (sic) statisticians – and for Windsor pancake-lovers – the menu offers I5 varieties, of which buttermilk, potato, banana and southern pecan are just four.
The menu also boasts a selection of waffles – 10 different types are listed – as well as eggs and omelettes, sandwiches, steaks, cutlets and other dinners.
“The restaurant will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.” Maria said.
“We expect this to be a high volume outlet as we get better known and business develops.” Lew added.
The restaurant has a seating capacity of 138 and a staff of about 55 to meet its customers’ demands.
But it won’t be Windsor’s only pancake house for long. A competitor, the International House of Pancakes, is now building a restaurant in on Tecumseh Road just east of Lauzon Road.
“That’s beautiful,” said Maria. “ln business, you must have competition.
“But l don’t think they’ll be a match for us.” she challenged.
**As a side note, there have been errors in spelling via my OCR scanner lately, but in the article above, there were several quotes that were never closed. That poor grammar, is not an error and is courtesy of the 1979 Windsor Star. 🙂
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