Sambo's restaurants...pictures - Beyond Tiki

T Tangaroa Tiki Socialite Joined: Apr 25, 2002 Posts: 1566	T Tangaroa Posted posted on Fri, Sep 17, 2004 7:58 AM Wow Bamboo Dude! Cool.... Tell me you have some interior photos of the locations you worked at! I'm having a tough time getting pictures of the actual restaurants... What you said jibes with the lady selling this auction (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=7101331440&ssPageName=STRK:MEWN:IT) Here's her take on Sambo's (she says she ran the Odessa, Texas location) Q: You said to ask... So, what in your opinion was the reason for Sambos' demise, when most of the competition (e.g. Denny's) that wasn't doing as well as they were at the time, still surviving? I'd be curious what you think. My family was involved in Sambo's at one time and had a restaurant in Fresno CA. But both parents are gone now so I missed my chance at the "real" story... Answered on Sep-14-04 A: Sambos expanded too quickly. They used the manager's money to build the chain. One would work almost 24/7 running his/her restaurant, and receive the option to purchase a "group" for $5000 at different intervals. The returns on the group - which was a percent of a group of various Sambos Restaurants - were phenomenal - almost too good to be true. So every time an option arose to purchase a group one took it, hence, Sambos built another store, and so on, and so on, then too good to be true was. We only lost 40K when is folded - I'm sure others lost more but many who were privy to inside information got out before it went bankrupt. They were the ones on the bottom of the pyramid. Sambos (the name) came from Sam Battistone and Newell Bohnett (who was called Bo) therefore - "Sambos". It was an interesting 7 years with Sambos. We moved to 3 different states climbing the ladder, ending up at headquarters in Santa Barbara, California - one year later the Company went down. pairinabox Interesting, eh?

Wow Bamboo Dude! Cool.... Tell me you have some interior photos of the locations you worked at! I'm having a tough time getting pictures of the actual restaurants...
What you said jibes with the lady selling this auction (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=7101331440&ssPageName=STRK:MEWN:IT)
Here's her take on Sambo's (she says she ran the Odessa, Texas location)

Q: You said to ask... So, what in your opinion was the reason for Sambos' demise, when most of the competition (e.g. Denny's) that wasn't doing as well as they were at the time, still surviving? I'd be curious what you think. My family was involved in Sambo's at one time and had a restaurant in Fresno CA. But both parents are gone now so I missed my chance at the "real" story...
Answered on Sep-14-04

A: Sambos expanded too quickly. They used the manager's money to build the chain. One would work almost 24/7 running his/her restaurant, and receive the option to purchase a "group" for $5000 at different intervals. The returns on the group - which was a percent of a group of various Sambos Restaurants - were phenomenal - almost too good to be true. So every time an option arose to purchase a group one took it, hence, Sambos built another store, and so on, and so on, then too good to be true was. We only lost 40K when is folded - I'm sure others lost more but many who were privy to inside information got out before it went bankrupt. They were the ones on the bottom of the pyramid. Sambos (the name) came from Sam Battistone and Newell Bohnett (who was called Bo) therefore - "Sambos". It was an interesting 7 years with Sambos. We moved to 3 different states climbing the ladder, ending up at headquarters in Santa Barbara, California - one year later the Company went down. pairinabox

Interesting, eh?

Post #115167 by Tangaroa on Fri, Sep 17, 2004 7:58 AM