Landmark restaurant to keep serving awhile
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Madeline Hodek | The Republic Customers at Lucas Brothers order and eat their food Thursday.
Lucas Bros. distinctive aroma likely will linger in Columbus for at least another month, according to owner Cheri Perkins.
Perkins said Thursday that she hopes to delay the closing of the business until at least Sept. 1.
Earlier this week, Perkins reported her plans to close the historic sandwich shop at Indiana Avenue and State Street the weekend of Aug. 4 due to declining business and rising maintenance costs.
However, she has decided to give the operation, noted for its aromatic and tasty hamburgers, an extra month, in part due to response from a story Wednesday in The Republic about the closing.
“We opened at 11 a.m. this morning, and from then on it’s been standing-room only,” Perkins said at 2 p.m. Thursday. “The lines have been so long that people have had to leave because they didn’t have enough time.”
Perkins said she still had to confirm some of the details of the extension Thursday afternoon but indicated she was optimistic the business would be able to continue until at least Sept. 1.
“We want to see if this popularity can hold on,” Perkins said. “We’ll make a final decision Sept. 1.”
Perkins received a number of suggestions on steps that might be taken to make the 74-year-old institution more viable.
One Republic reader suggested that contact be made with producers of the reality television show “Restaurant Impossible,” which remakes outdated restaurants.
Most of the responses to the newspaper, however, were summed up by Lucas Bros. fan Dorothy Yeaton who declared in an email to The Republic, “I nearly suffered cardiac arrest when I saw (the story of the closing on) today’s page 1!”
The article also had an international reach.
Steve Lucas, the son of Lucas Bros. co-founders Pete and Jane Lucas, wrote from his retirement home in the Republic of Panama that he remembered “flipping those Lucas Bros. hamburgers” when he was a student in Columbus.
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