Kiger's Notebook

Fat Willy's gearing up for Nov. opening

Bill Henderson, the driving force behind the new hot rod garage-themed bar and grill cruising into south Rochester, says his project, Fat Willy's, is getting into gear.

"We're started now," he says of the construction. "Away we go. I'm excited. I'm ready to go on this."

The eatery is being tuned up in a commercial building across from the Wehrenberg Galaxy 14 Cine Theaters in the Shoppes on Maine development along U.S. 63 South.

Thursday is his last day managing the Mayo Civic Center concessions for Canadian Honker owner Joe Powers. Henderson, who is retired from Mayo Clinic, has worked with Powers since he opened the Honker in 1985.

After wrapping up all of those years working for Powers, he is shifting into the fast lane with his own place, which he is naming after the classic 1941 Willys Coupe, as well as his own silhouette.

Fat Willy's is now speeding toward an opening in November, possibly on Thanksgiving weekend. Henderson's Iowa buddies are rolling into the Med City that weekend. Because they couldn't get tickets to watch the Hawkeyes play the University of Minnesota, he hopes to be able to park them at Fat Willy's to watch the college football clash.

'That Girl" calls Roch. home again

That Girl is now taking calls in her hometown of Rochester.

Lisa Hendrickson launched the new Med City base of operations for Call That Girl, her six-year-old computer support firm.

"It looked like a good opportunity and a chance to grow," she says of moving her business back to Rochester after running it in the Twin Cities since 2007.

Hendrickson moved into ground-level space at 521 N. Broadway that was last occupied by Danielle's E-Shoes & More. While she is putting the finishing touches on the space and is hiring an assistant, That Girl is clear that she is open for business.

"I'm here and ready to go," she says.

Her services include technical fixes and upgrades that focus mainly on software. Hendrickson repairs virus-ravaged systems, provides software and handles home-networking duties. Much of the work she does for small businesses, home-office workers, telecommuters and home users — currently about 800 clients — is done remotely.

Dialing in online saves the customer the hassle of pulling cords and hauling a wonky computer to her office. This is particularly popular with her work-at-home customers who need a quick fix.

Her return to Rochester came about when the people renting the home she lived in here while working at Mayo Clinic decided to move out. She decided it was time to bring her business back to where it was created.

"I've been planning it about a year," Hendrickson says. "I guess I just keeping coming back to the well.

Mayo Clinic lands $9.87M fed contract

Here's a tidbit I just noticed:

WASHINGTON, Sept. 30 -- Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn., won a $9,867,850 federal contract from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md., for the development of a population genetics analysis program.

I have a call into Mayo Clinic to find out the details on this. I know $9.87 million is not a big number for a Mayo contract, but I'm interested in what "a population genetics analysis program" is.

Economist talks about costs of government rules

Here's some from a quick article about a speaker brought here by Grow Rochester, a coalition made of Rochester Area Builders, Southeast Minnesota Realtors and the Rochester Area Chamber of Commerce

The full piece is posted here:

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Government rules push up costs and often have unintended consequences.

That was the core message that about 50 to 70 Rochester home builders, Realtors, bankers, local officials and others heard Wednesday morning from a senior economist for the National Association of Home Builders.

"It always has an impact," says Dr. Elliot Eisenberg, a senior economist for the National Association of Home Builders."Politicians like to think builders pay, but do they really?"

Waving his arms and using colorful examples, the energetic economist talked about unintended consequences of government intervention on the home building industry.

"Every rule you impose, it raises cost of production," he told the crowd of mostly builders that recently opposed a new Rochester ordinance to require developers to plant trees.

Using microeconomics, Eisenberg said that often regulations have unexpected effects.

He pointed to the regulation of the sale of cold and allergy medicine to try to keep people from making the illegal drug meth.

Instead of controlling that, it made meth made in Mexico relatively cheaper.
"Seemingly good ideas often have bad outcomes. Now instead of good American meth, people are buying Mexican meth," he said jokingly.

John Hardy's Bar-B-Q closes Cedarwood spot

Here's the restaurant news I caught a whiff of yesterday.

Actually, I need to thank several Twitter followers for tipping me off to this last night.

For our print readers - and you all should be reading the print edition, this item is not in the version of my column in the first run of today's paper, but it is in the later city edition of the paper.

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It turns out that having a third restaurant in the mix didn't add up for John Hardy's Bar-B-Q in Rochester.

"It was an extremely difficult decision," say owner John Brockman of closing the third location of John Hardy's at 4180 18th Ave. N.W.
 
However, John Hardy's fans can breathe easy. The other two restaurants on South Broadway and on the U.S. 52 North frontage road remain open and cooking.

He speculates that hitting the economy at a bad time and essentially diluting his barbecue customer base made the project unworkable in the end.

The restaurant in front of the Cedarwood Plaza shopping center closed Monday.

About 15 people, most part-time, were working there. While three managers were unfortunately let go, says Brockman, he is trying to absorb the rest of the staff into the other locations.

He opened the Cedarwood location in the former Roscoe’s Rootbeer & Ribs eatery about a year ago.

Now Brockman is talking to other potential restaurateurs about subleasing the northwest Rochester building.

Something cooking in the Med City?

Smells like changes might be cooking at a Rochester eatery.

I'll keep sniffing to see if something really is simmering or if it is just the scent of cold leftovers.

Crab Deck starts to get its claws into Roch.

Many of you out there spotted this and tipped me off.

It looks like The Crab Deck's plans to open a Rochester store are swimming - slowly - along.

While the space next to the Maid-Rite Diner in the new version of the Crossroads Plaza is still in a very rough, early stage, a sign is up and on display for South Broadway drivers.

  There is a building permit in the window, so I'd guess the build out will start steaming along now.

Gary Wolter, who also has a Crab Deck store in North Mankato, is the captain of this vessel.

He says to expect lots of fresh halibut, many varieties of shrimp, scallops, sushi-grade tuna, sea bass, cold and warm water lobster, calamari, scallops and crab to be sold when the 1,850-square-foot seafood market opens.

CineMagic CEO: Biz as usual, despite bankruptcy

The CEO of CineMagic says Rochester and Austin moviegoers should not see any impact from the company's recent filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

  "We certainly don't anticipate any changes in Rochester and Austin. It is business as usual," says Steve Tripp, CEO and president of Midwest Theatres Corp., which owns and operates nine Cinemagic Theaters in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa.

It owns two in Rochester, including the Chateau Theater that it purchased from developer Gus Chafoulias in 2006.

"This is a reorganization of the company in reference to another theater location," he says.

Midwest Theatres filed for bankruptcy on Sept. 14 after a bank began foreclosure proceedings on its St. Michael, Minn., movie theater. The bankruptcy filing lists the company as having $10.7 million in debt and $9.4 million in assets.

Mayo Clinic researcher + $2.5M award for drug addiction work

Mayo Clinic's William Brimijoin, Ph.d., won one of the Avant-Garde Awards for Innovative Medication Development Research by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

  He is working on gene therapy to prevent cocaine addicts from relapsing, according to the announcement.

Being one of the four scientists to win these first-ever awards means he'll get $500,000 a year for five years  - $2.5 million - to further the research.

The award was announced last week. The awarding institute is an offshoot of the National Institutes of Health.

I might have more on this soon.

Broadway Pizza cooking along

It is not on Broadway or near the railroad tracks, but Broadway Bar & Pizza will soon be chugging along with pizza, sandwiches and "a fun atmosphere" in Rochester, according to the owner.

Franchise owner Derek Wodziak is getting close to opening a Med City location of the Twin Cities-based pizza chain in the former Timber Lodge Steak House, 4144 U.S. 52 N.

  He hopes to fire up the kitchen and a couple of model trains in late October or early November.

"We're going for a really fun atmosphere," he says. "It is not just a pizza joint. It is gathering place where people come to have fun"

Expect a full menu with burgers, pastas, soups, wraps and salads. The bar will feature 12 beers on tap.

Broadway will roll out a daily lunch buffet and have a special family night on Mondays with kids eating free as a magician goes from table to table.

Look for bar bingo to be played with cash prizes up to $1,000. And Wodziak also plans to beef up the fun with the ever popular meat raffles.

Adding to the train station decor, it will have two larger than usual model trains steaming around on tracks throughout the restaurant.

"Everybody thinks trains are cool," Wodziak says.

Of course, that is not always the case in Rochester. As long as they don't cause traffic problems or derail, I think it will be OK.

Wodziak expects to have a staff of about 40 working in the 7,100-square-foot building. It has been empty since Timber Lodge closed in November 2009.