For most Ohio State students the only options for breakfast food in the early morning hours are Tee-Jay’s, Steak ‘n’ Shake or if you’re brave, White Castle. In the midst of south campus “reconstruction,” with new chain stores and restaurants lining High Street, something new and locally owned is opening.
Two former and two current OSU students are opening Nick’s Diner, a new breakfast place at 1646 Neil Avenue. Co-owner Mike Keyes, a sixth year senior in hospitality management, says they have always wanted a place like Nick’s.
“John (Pedro), Tony (Pedro) and myself all lived together at Ohio State and worked at the bars together. We always wanted a late-night place to get eggs,” Keyes said. “There was just no place on campus to get eggs.”
Keyes and his fellow owner Nick Pedro are still attending classes at OSU and empathize with the current campus residents who would like a home-cooked breakfast without driving 10 minutes to get it.
“I always wanted a breakfast place and there wasn’t any. That is where we came up with the idea,” Keyes said.
“I thought it would be number one, a great business because you could dominate because there really isn’t anything that is walkable on campus where you can get breakfast.”
The two former OSU students, John and Tony Pedro, played major roles in getting the operation off the ground.
“John did all the construction work, he is a project manager for a construction company. Tony is in finance, so he is dealing with the money and Nick and I are the restaurant guys,” Keyes said.
The two students researched old-school type diners and spiced up the design with a modern twist.
“We came up with the concept by reading books and going to a bunch of different diners,” Keyes said.
“I like to go to a lot of different places, so we just wanted to combine different things from a lot of places and then put them into our place,” Nick said.
It was a major renovation to turn what used to be part of Arabica coffeehouse into the diner they envisioned. The restaurant was originally supposed to open in August, but many bumps had to be overcome.
“Everything that could go wrong has gone wrong,” Keyes said.
Part of the problem was the age of the building, which forced the owners to change their remodeling plans for the former Arabica location.
“The building is 80 years old, and our landlord has been great, but the building is so old we had problems. We had a pipe break upstairs three weeks ago and that damaged some of the drywall,” Nick said.
One major problem they faced was that they had nowhere to tie in to the existing sewer line. This caused a month delay.
“We had to put a sewer line in,” Keyes explained.
“The sewer was maxed-out upstairs so we couldn’t tie into existing sewer lines, so we had to put in a brand new sewer tank. There was three of us digging at one given time, with Mike and I doing most of the digging, and it was all rock and clay,” Nick said.
“It took us a month to dig a 90 foot trench three feet deep. We would work from eight in the morning until four in the morning to try and get it done.”
The reason that the two were the force behind the digging of the trench was due to their financial situation.
“We’re young guys and we aren’t the richest guys in the world. I mean I’m still in school and so is Nick and we are not rich at all. We scraped some money together and at one point it wasn’t quite enough so we had to re-evaluate our finances, but it worked out,” Keyes said.
“We pretty much gutted the whole place. We tore down rock in the back. We tore down walls and we hung new drywall. We re-did the whole kitchen, new water, gas, everything,” Nick said.
They wanted to change the look of the dining area by opening up the ceiling and changing the color scheme.
“The ceiling in the main dining area was a dropped ceiling. We took out of the tiles, but we left the grid and as you go down to the floor it is even bigger grid,” Nick said. “It all just ties in very nicely.”
“The whole ceiling is exposed. All of the fixtures, wires and the air and heating ducts are exposed. We went for the traditional diner look, but we wanted to give it a modern feel,” Keyes said. “We have the chrome edged tables, the traditional diner chairs and we wanted the diner plates and the diner feel. It has a modern twist to it with the color scheme.”
Another way that the old-school diner atmosphere will be apparent will be the uniforms of the workers at Nick’s. Each area of the restaurant will sport the same T-shirts, each with alterations to distinguish them from the different areas they work in.
“The staff will be wearing T-shirts that say Nick’s Diner across the front and the shirts for the diner are white with blue lettering. The shirts for the coffee shop are gray with Nick’s Diner on the front and caffeine on the back,” Nick said.
Just like other early morning diners, Nick’s has its specialties to fill the bellies of south campus area stomachs.
“We have a big breakfast that everyone has, like Jack and Benny’s has the Barnyard Buster. We have got the Mike’s Big Breakfast, which is two pancakes, two eggs, home fries, sausage, bacon, ham and French toast,” Nick said.
Because they are in the campus area they understand that students are not rich people, so they have adjusted their prices accordingly.
“Our concept here is we understand that everyone here are students, so we are going to serve a home style breakfast at reasonable prices,” Keyes said.
Other than the “Mike’s Big Breakfast,” Nick’s will have other breakfast specialties, such as a variety of breakfast sandwiches that will be made to order. So the student on his way to or from his or her class can stop in for a quick sandwich to go.
“Students don’t have a lot of time so we are going to have homestyle sandwiches made to order. It will be bigger sandwiches for a cheaper price than McDonald’s,” Keyes said.
The two owners realize that a key to any business is that the customer is always right, and they want the area residents to inform them of any changes they would like to see.
“We are very campus-oriented and so any suggestions about our menu or anything else we will always take into consideration,” Nick said. “Whatever anybody can give us to make the place run better we will take it.”
For those that just need coffee to start their day, a coffee shop will be located in the diner.
“If you turn to the left when you enter the diner you will walk into the coffee shop. There are five or six seats for people to wait for a friend. The shop will have all the coffees you want. We will carry a variety of blends, with a specialty blend everyday,” Nick said. “It will also have various pastries, cheesecakes, bagels and other coffee-shop food.”
Though the restaurant will only be open until 2 p.m. seven days a week, the coffee shop will stay open until 10 p.m. Students can sit and study or drink their coffee in the dining area if they need a place to relax between classes.
One of the reasons for their location on Neil instead of High Street is because of the Campus Partners movement. But they feel that this is a better situation for them because the area fits their target audience.
“Where we are at on Neil we cannot only target ourselves to the students, but to the professional students as well,” Nick said. “I feel it is better location than we would of ever gotten on High Street.”
Keyes feels in a sense that is good but they are also taking something away from campus.
“Restaurants unique to Ohio State are going out of business. Greek Village is going out of business, and that is one of my favorite gyro places around,” Keyes said.
“Campus Partners is bringing in all these chain stores, because they are the only ones that can afford to pay their high rent. They act like they are doing everyone a favor by cleaning up south campus, which they are, but they are making it less unique,” Keyes said.
The two current OSU students will be the ones running the day-to-day operations at the restaurant, while the other two will stay behind the scenes.
“Mike will be running the front of the house and I will be running the kitchen. We will switch up every so often so we won’t get bored,” Nick said.
There is only one thing now that is holding the restaurant from opening. They are waiting on equipment such as grills and refrigerators. “The only thing that still needs to be on schedule is the equipment coming in, which is on order and paid for,” Keyes said.
“We are still hiring for all positions; waitresses, bus boys, dishwashers, kitchen help, anything,” Keyes said. Since two of the owners are still in college they understand their workers will need to have flexible schedules to accommodate their school schedules.
The tentative date for the grand opening is Monday, just in time for finals.
