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COMIC STRIP CUISINE

Blondie’s bumbling hero Dagwood inspires sandwich chain

By Neil Janowitz

For over 75 years Dagwood Bumstead, the bumbling yet endearing husband in the Blondie newspaper comic strip, has been at once a source of entertainment and envy for sandwich lovers everywhere. They enjoy watching Dagwood construct his eponymous sandwich, which first appeared in the strip in 1936 and whose size was limited only by its preparer’s imagination and the contents of his refrigerator.

That’s why, roughly 30 years ago, Dean Young began collecting recipes. As the son of Blondie creator Chic Young and the current creative force behind the strip, Young envisioned a Dagwood-themed sandwich shop that would finally deliver those towering lunches strip fans had long drooled over. When Young met Lamar Berry in late 2005, the Dagwood concept began taking shape. Berry, Dagwood’s Sandwich Shoppes’ CEO and co-founder, had been a director of marketing and franchise owner with the Popeye’s chain from 1975 to 1989.

Berry’s expertise and Young’s vision made a winning combination, says Kara Hamilton, Dagwood’s project supervisor. “Dean goes to New Orleans to our test kitchen to oversee the menu development, and Lamar is the business engine.” But though their roles and business experience are different, their vision for the chain could not be more unified.

“We wanted the restaurants to be very fun,” said Hamilton. “So we’ve designed it to be like entering a comic strip world.” To that end, the company’s first store, at press time scheduled to open sometime this month, in Palm Harbor, Fla., is loaded with accents intended to provide a whimsical experience. The employees are dubbed “performers.” The floors are paved with sleek hardwood, and the walls are peppered with framed comic strips and plasma TVs playing cartoon loops. Up front, the kitchen is open to provide a clear view of the entire sandwich-building process; customers watch as wraps, subs and the signature pound-and-a-half, foot-tall Dagwood sandwich are constructed. And the restaurant contains a gift area stocked with a merchandise line.

The flagship store is additionally designed to function as a showroom of sorts for aspiring franchisees. Nestled into the open-air, Publix-anchored Coral Landings shopping center, the unit occupies a 1,500-square-foot single-bay storefront. Though the company itself built out the initial site, the store will be handed over to a franchisee shortly after launch, and the company will maintain a franchises-only policy from that point forward. Hamilton says anyone interested in one of these franchises should expect to pay about $250,000 in fees and construction costs, with the work taking roughly 90 days.

But before any potential investors start gathering finances, they will want to consult with Frank Brown, the senior vice president of development, to pick a geographical area, among other things. Though the second and third Dagwood’s units are set to open in West Palm Beach and Largo, the company plans to expand exceedingly quickly outside of Florida. To date, they have contracts with franchisees for approximately 400 units, tentatively scheduled for launch over the next three to five years. Bolstering that aggressive growth plan is the company’s unwavering confidence in its target demographic: baby boomers.

“Dagwood’s Sandwich Shoppes will be able to connect directly with the ‘sandwich generation,’ who were brought up reading Blondie,” said Hamilton.

Though they intend to price their items in the range of such competitors as Quiznos and Firehouse Subs, Hamilton says the company is encouraging franchisees to offer some more-sophisticated treats, such as beer and wine. The package is designed to appeal to an audience that Hamilton says visits sandwich-style restaurants twice a week. Even so, the Dagwood’s plan is not without skeptics.

“Yes, Americans like sandwiches for lunch, and there is room for growth,” said restaurant expert Paul G. W. Fetscher, CLS, president of Long Beach, N.Y.-based Great American Brokerage. “But at the same time, there are more players in that arena than in the burger industry.” That’s why Fetscher has two primary concerns about the Dagwood’s model.

“Consumers want authenticity, and the challenge with a heavily branded business model like this one is that I don’t know how many people read Blondie anymore,” Fetscher said. “That’s what we learned from businesses such as Arthur Treacher’s and Roy Rogers: Once gimmicky restaurants lose their cultural relevance, their attempt to be recognizable almost works against them. They seem outdated.”

Beyond the brand identity, Fetscher says he wonders how successfully Dagwood’s will find a pricing identity. “Everyone wants eat-quick casual these days,” he said. “Considering that they’re promising a somewhat upscale experience, large sandwiches and possibly alcohol, I don’t see how they’ll be able to stay within the prices of Quiznos and the like without sacrificing quality. But at the growth scale they’re talking, and trying to capture suburban lunch-break crowds, they won’t be able to charge higher prices. I’m not saying it can’t happen, I’ll just believe it when I see it.”

For all that, this is a good time to be opening a restaurant. “People are so busy these days, eating has become a chore,” said Fetscher. “They spend all their time at home and the office, so when it comes time to eat, they look for a third place, an escape. If Dagwood’s can provide good service, they will succeed. But if you’re going to charge more, you must meet expectations and do so in a timely manner. Offer customers that, and they’ll be happy.”

Quality will be a priority, says the Dagwood’s team. Together with Mark Yegge, Bob Coston is the franchisee for the Tampa Bay territory, which includes the Largo and Countryside stores. Though Coston, being Young’s son-in-law, may be inherently biased, he says the company is poised to do great things.

“Just within my own territory, I’m working with franchisees to develop 50 stores over the next five years in five different Tampa Bay counties,” said Coston. “We’re expecting immediate rapid growth. Our competitors, like Subway and Quiznos, have already saturated their territories. The only way they can grow is by selling more sandwiches in existing locations. But we’re just getting started on growing the company.” Coston acknowledges that the company’s goal of opening 4,000 stores over the next five years is ambitious, but Dagwood’s is making believers of many of those around them.

“I’d read about the concept in the past, and I saw the strength in the team they had assembled,” said Andrew Hupp, who owns the unnamed open-air center in which Coston’s Largo storefront is located. Hupp dabbled in the restaurant industry himself five years ago as the franchisee of a Beef O’Brady’s, and so he knew what to look for in a restaurant tenant. “The company has a lot of financial strength and a great model,” he said. “Our center gets a lot of daytime traffic, so Dagwood’s should thrive in that setting, while also drawing more customers in.”

Customers are the one thing a highly recognizable company such as Dagwood’s can expect in its infancy. “Blondie still rates very high in newspaper reader polls,” said Coston. “We know we’re selling in part based on the strip, so we closely monitor the numbers. It’s maintained its popularity.”

The owners are banking that this popularity will help Dagwood’s Sandwich Shoppes grow just like a Dagwood sandwich: improbably large, but standing strong nonetheless.