Post #404121 by thefuzz on Tue, Aug 26, 2008 8:49 AM

Found in the Seattle Times

August 25, 2008 11:59 AM

A final "aloha": Trader Vic's closes in Bellevue

Posted by Nancy Leson

Trader Vic's has seen its day -- again. The Lincoln Square restaurant closed after service Saturday -- two and a half years after its much-anticipated opening. "I'd heard rumors they were going to be closing," said a concierge at the adjacent Bellevue Westin late last night. Yet employees working at the hotel, just a mai tai splash from Trader Vic's front door, were surprised to find the restaurant's windows papered over on Sunday.

"It closed because it just didn't make it," said restaurant-consultant Larry Hamlin, one of about 25 local investors in the franchise -- who'd hoped the Lincoln Square restaurant would bring back the paradise lost after Trader Vic's at the Seattle Westin closed in 1991.

The Bellevue location proved less than golden, according to Hamlin. "All of the investors lost their money." Managing-partner Paul Reder, owner of the Tap House Grill, "put in over a million and a half dollars and was the one feeding it during this period of losing money," said Hamlin, citing a letter sent to investors late last week. "It was not successful, they were losing money every month and they determined it was best just to close."

When word went out in 2006 that the iconic restaurant chain would open in Bellevue, Trader Vic's-ionados --including Seattle's celebrity auctioneer Sharon Friel (whose signature adornment is a gardenia -- commemorating a love affair with Trader Vic's that goes back to her sorority days) and Bellevue attorney Theresa Dowell (whose Leschi home is a tiki-lover's treasure chest of Trader Vic's memorabilia) were thrilled to hear that "TV's" was coming back to the Seattle area. "I'm ecstatic! It's a dream come true," Dowell said at the time. She'd traveled as far as London, Taipei and Bangkok to eat crab rangoon and drink the Trader's signature cocktails.

But as competition for diner's dollars reached a crescendo in Bellevue and elsewhere, stratospheric prices --among other disappointments -- have kept some hard-core fans from returning to the Lincoln Square restaurant.

Tom Robinson has eaten at Trader Vic's' the world-over for nearly 50 years, and attended the gala preview-dinner in Bellevue with his wife, Barb. But they've made very few treks from their home in Edmonds since then. "It's not a destination anymore and I don't think the franchises are going to do very well. They've cheapened it," said Robinson, whose house, like Dowell's, is decorated with Trader Vic's memorabilia. "I thought it wouldn't last, but I didn't think it would close this fast," Robinson said after hearing the news of the closure. "We were there just a few weeks ago for the first time in a year and a half." Lunch service, he said, was abominable -- despite a near-empty dining room.

Robinson has been less enchanted with the place for many reasons, including a downslide in both food and service. As for drinks? His favorites are now made with "Trader Vic's"-brand rum rather than the orignal Meyer's. These are problems that extend well beyond Bellevue, he said. While dining at the London Trader Vic's, Robinson heard that the owner was in the house and complained about the "cheapening" of the cocktails to the manager -- asking him to pass the word on to his higher-up. "I told him they should maintain the Trader Vic's tradition and said, if it goes on like this, the chain won't survive." Back in the day, Robinson says, they'd have apologized and comped his drink. Instead, "Every time the owner walked through the bar, he'd look my way, and if looks could kill I'd be dead now."

Charity auctioneer Sharon Friel was also surprised to hear about the closure. "This is stunning," she said this morning. Especially since she'd just called Trader Vic's on Friday, hoping to have them set aside some bottles of mai tai-mix to serve at a Hawaiian themed party she held at her home yesterday. "They told me they were out," she said. Ditto for the little salt-and-pepper menehune she'd hope to buy as party favors. "But no one said anything about closing."

Friel admits that she and her husband Dick haven't been to Trader Vic's in 18 months, and senses that the closure is "a sign of the times." Not just the financial downturn, she says, but a generational change. "It was my generation that has all these memories," says the former sorority-sister who recalls Trader Vic's original Seattle location as the height of luxury back in the early '60s. "But even I didn't support it."

For patrons who did, the closure has hit hard. "Our group has met in the lounge every Sunday for Happy Hour since the doors opened just over two years ago," wrote Michael Merry in an email sent to the Seattle Times -- after he'd heard rumors of the closure. "We call it our `church.' Sometimes it's two of us, sometimes it's close to 20. We think it is a great way to end one week and prepare for another." Merry will miss "the best smoked ribs and mai tais I have ever tasted" -- and especially, the Trader Vic's staff. "They're like our family, and it will be hard to see them leave."