BREAD GARDEN HEADS SOUTH
By Adnews Staff
The Spectra Group of Great Restaurants of Vancouver has decided that the money is probably greener on the other side of the border. The company has no plans to expand its Bread Garden Bakery Cafe chain in Canada, marketing vice-president Leslee Kerfoot told Adnews yesterday. However, it is testing its deli-style restaurant concept in Denver, Colorado. The company opened the first outlet in February and will open another in May. Specter will decide at the end of this year if it wants to roll out to other markets in the U.S. The U.S. operations are being headed up by Clark Knipper, who was formerly real estate vice-president at Brinker International. The U.S. outlets are being promoted with PR from Hill & Knowlton's Vancouver office. Spectra has 10 Bread Garden restaurants in Vancouver. Print and point-of-purchase advertising for the chain is handled in-house. Radio is done by Griffith, Gibson, Ramsay Productions of Vancouver. The Bread Garden restaurants are patterned after a bakery of the same name that operated in Berkeley, California in the 1970s. Bakers Gary Rouse and Lisa Meinhart opened a similar shop in Vancouver in 1981, which Spectra bought in 1990. Spectra owns 33 restaurants in Canada and the U.S. Besides the Bread Garden chain it has outlets operating under the banners Milestone's, The Boathouse, Romano's, Macaroni Grill, Chili's Texas Grill and Yankee Diner.