Kingston-born restaurant chain marks quarter-century

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As Nelson Lang stood in front of the Pita Pit just steps away from the corner of Princess and Division streets, the flagship store of the business he cofounded, he recognizes and says hello to a few passersby.

While Lang hasn’t called Kingston home for a couple of decades, ever since the franchising side of the business took off, he was a familiar face for years behind the counter to many of those looking for something healthy to eat after a night in the Hub district.

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“I think that’s one thing I really liked about it is you connect with people,” he would say later of those early days. “And some of those early friendships continue.”

That was back in the mid-1990s, when he and partner John Sotiriadis left their previous ventures in Newcastle — Lang ran a pizzeria, Sotiriadis a sub shop — and the friends moved to Kingston to start their first fresh food franchise.

“I saw a lot of competition in pizza,” recalled Lang, who noted that the large American chains, like Domino’s and Little Caesars, were expanding north. “So I thought I’d do something unique, and John was thinking the same thing.”

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And when the original Pita Pit opened 25 years ago this month, it was unlike all of the other fast-food options around, offering a healthier alternative to burgers, pizza and the traditional late-night fare.

The original storefront, which sat adjacent to the current one on Princess Street near Division, was a tiny space, measuring fewer than 400 square feet. It was so small that the extra ingredients had to be kept in chest freezers in the upstairs apartment, while their car, a 1995 Beretta, doubled as the company’s office.

“The work was hard. Long hours. 15, 17 hours a day. Working from 11 in the morning until 4 in the morning,” Lang said, who remembers roller-blading through the city’s empty streets once the bar rush had finished and before catching a couple hours of sleep and starting all over again. “That was hard on me.”

The pair had chosen Kingston over Guelph as the site for their venture after falling in love with the city’s downtown (once they finally found it off Division Street).

They particularly liked the waterfront area, but chose to open in the Hub district instead since students didn’t head to the waterfront as much in the winter, and it was the student population they were targeting.

“We wanted to be close to the bar scene and the students,” he said.

Their instincts were right.

“My wife asked me, ‘How many stores do you think you’re going to open?’ I said, ‘Ten stores. One a year over the next 10 years.’ And we opened up 210 stores in seven years,” Lang laughed, adding that the first 100 franchises were purposely located near post-secondary schools.

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They opened four new Pita Pits in 1997, in Peterborough, Ottawa, and Guelph. In ‘98, a dozen opened; the next year, more than two dozen.

“There was that kind of ‘Aha!’ moment at about 10 (stores), where I go, ‘You know what? We have something here,’ ” recalled Lang, who said that many of the first franchisees were friends and family.

It was in 1998 that franchise requests started to pour in, and Lang and Sotiriadis — who eventually left the company in 2005 — took to the road on a full-time basis, sussing out would-be franchisees and locations in person.

“There were a lot of years when I was just on the road, from one rental car to the next,” he remembered.

They wanted franchisees to work in the stores they owned, just as they had. And the company still uses what they call its “barbecue test,” a home meal at which Lang can see if the new owner is a fit, personality-wise.

He’s about to have another such test, as the company is about to open its first franchise in Sweden. There are already Pita Pits in places such as Ireland, France, and Trinidad and Tobago, as well as in New Zealand and Australia.

Lang was in Kingston earlier this week to mark the company’s 25th anniversary. That celebration was supposed to take place at the company’s annual convention, which was to take place in Nashville this year. But then, of course, the pandemic shut most businesses down. And, like most businesses, Pita Pit was not immune to its impact.

Sales dropped to a fifth of what they typically were as the lockdown was declared.

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“We went from everything being rosy to sales being down 80%, so once it hit, it hit hard for us,” Lang explained. “So from the end of March into the month of April, I was kind of terrified. You build this business for 25 years and every time you turn on the news, it was just terrible.”

Sales have bounced back in the past six to eight weeks, he said, with the gradual reopening of businesses. Luckily for many of the Canadian franchisees, landlords took advantage of government-initiated programs.

He’s worried that when those programs and deferrals end, a lot of restaurants will close up.

“I think the worst is yet to come. I think once these mortgages are not being deferred anymore, a lot of these guys are going to have to start paying full pop. We’re going to see October, November, December, there’s going to be another fallout of a lot of restaurants that just won’t make it through,” Lang said.

While Canadian franchises have reopened, they have taken a hit south of the border.

“I was shocked because we were thinking, what’s going to be the fallout? Is it 60, 70 restaurants that we’re going to lose out of the roughly 600 that we have. I was thinking it would be a lot bigger. In the U.S., we’ve lost probably 20 stores out of 185 already,” he said, adding that he’s read predictions that 100,000 North American restaurants will shutter because of the pandemic.

If he were to open his own franchise today, he would be sure to include a drive-thru option, as the Pita Pit near Dalton Avenue in Kingston actually saw its sales go up during the lockdown.

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That’s something else he’s been seeing: the franchises located near popular big-box stores are starting to outsell even those near the post-secondary schools, in part because those students who used to purchase Pita Pit are now adults who shop there.

As he drove to Kingston to be here for the 25th anniversary celebrations Monday evening — they had to settle for a virtual toast with franchisees — he did so along Highway 2, making some stops along the way and taking his time, really, for the first time.

When Lang finally arrived, he took some time to appreciate what he and his company have accomplished in the past quarter-century.

“It was nice reflecting, sitting in the office and looking at that picture of John and I in our cut-off shorts and our T-shirts building that first Pita Pit. Where does 25 years go? Yesterday, I was able to slow the whole day down, and that’s not what it’s been like for the past 25 years,” Lang said.

“It’s been a helluva journey, and who knows where it’s going to go now.”

phendra@postmedia.com

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