CAA: GA News, "Airport's restaurant shuts down"

["Stephen Irwin" <stepheni@xxxxxxxxx>]

Saturday, January 4, 2003

Airport's restaurant shuts down
By Cindy Arora
The Whittier (CA) Daily News


EL MONTE -- Diane Hershkowitz took a leap of faith about a year ago when
she left her job as an accountant and followed her passion for cooking.

For seven months, Hershkowitz and her nine employees from Mallard's Sky
Dive Cafe gave El Monte residents, employees and pilots fine-dining
cuisine in the unusual location of a small airport.

But on Christmas Eve, the 49- year-old Hershkowitz made her last
"Tomahawk,' a hamburger with Ortega chilies and jack cheese and closed
the door of the kitschy aviation-themed bistro.

"We didn't have enough capitalization ... we just couldn't stir up
enough business,' she said. "It's been heartbreaking.'

Mallard's Sky Dive Cafe at 4233 Santa Anita Ave. opened its doors May 30
in the new administration building at El Monte Airport. The building was
intended to serve as a focal point for airport users and to provide
meeting rooms and a restaurant. 

El Monte was the only airport in Southern California that did not have a
restaurant.

Hershkowitz, a pilot and a graduate from the California Culinary Arts
School in Pasadena, approached the county with her idea of an
aviation-themed restaurant, which they quickly snapped up.

Combining her zeal for cooking, her background in accounting and El
Monte's lack of high-end restaurants, Hershkowitz had high hopes.

She leased 2,625 square feet of the terminal for $1,705 a month,invested
$6,000 of her own money, put a second mortgage on her home and received
more than $60,000 in capital from investors and her mom.

But it wasn't enough.

"People would tell me I wasn't charging enough but then people would
come in and tell me I was charging too much for the $3.95 breakfast,'
Hershkowitz said. "If I was in Santa Monica I could have charged more
but here you have to cut down more and simplify the menu.'

The restaurant is being sold for $75,000, but because of the location it
could be a challenge to find a buyer.

"It's in an oddball location ... I don't know if there is enough traffic
in the airport to sustain a high-end restaurant,' said Mario Carron, the
real estate broker selling Mallard's.

According to officials from the Small Business Association, starting a
new restaurant business has an 85-percent failure rate.

But Carron said all businesses in the hospitality industry are
struggling. "The restaurant business in general is in trouble,' he said.
"It's such a tough and difficult business right now.'

Add an unusual location and a lack of advertising and this put Mallard's
at a major disadvantage.

"Nobody even saw the signs out there,' Hershkowitz said. "But when
people would come in and see the room they were enchanted.'

The bistro sat in a corner of the airport with a huge window and patio
that allowed customers to watch planes arrive and depart from the
airport.

"We don't have too many good places around here to eat ... we'll have to
change that,' said Harold Johanson, city manager for El Monte.

While the city and the airport look for a new restaurant to take the
place of Mallard's Sky Dive Cafe, Hershkowitz said she's going back to
accounting and recovering from her experience as a restaurateur.

"You don't think about the reality of how it's going to be,' she said.
"We were so close to making it ...'

Attached Photo:

Planes on El Monte Airport's tarmac are reflected in the windows of the
Mallard's Sky Dive cafe as Elena Trevino serves the first customers
after ribbon cutting ceremony.

mallard.jpg