![]() ![]() (A First Watch location in the Corporate Woods business park in suburban Overland Park closed a little over six years ago.)įirst Watch locations are open from 7 a.m. (Ironically, there are no First Watch locations in California, the state where they first started.) The Lee's Summit location opened in the summer of 2021, the fourth location in the Kansas City area. Today, there are nearly 400 First Watch restaurants in 20 states - primarily in Texas, Florida, and Arizona. In 2014, First Watch bought the 20 locations of the Phoenix-based Good Egg breakfast/lunch cafe chain, then a year later they purchased the 114 locations of the Colorado-based Egg and I restaurants eventually converting them to First Watch restaurants. They decided to keep many of the restaurants company-owned with a handful of franchise locations. In 1986, Sullivan and Pendrey moved their base of operations to Bradenton, FL and continued their growth of the First Watch concept. They opened a second First Watch location in San Mateo, CA in the South Bay area of San Francisco. The name First Watch comes from a nautical term for the first duty time of the day on ships. They opened their new restaurant - First Watch - in 1983. The two found a place overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Pacific Grove, CA, just outside of Monterey. ![]() Looking for a new challenge, Sullivan and Pendery moved out to California to start their new breakfast/lunch venture. The term "peep" is evidently a Quebecois word for a certain sexual act.) (My French-Canadian colleagues used to get a kick out of seeing the Le Peep restaurants when we would be in Denver for trade shows years ago. Sullivan and Pendery stayed on during the transition, but the two soon left the company after a falling out with the new corporate ownership. Pendery eventually became the president and CEO of Le Peep and by the early 80's they were looking to sell the growing chain of restaurants.Īnother veteran of the Colorado restaurant industry, Buddy Waldman, headed a group of investors who ended up buying Le Peep in 1981 with the plan to take the concept nationally. He was joined in the firm by Ken Pendery who worked for the same steak and seafood restaurant as Sullivan. ![]() Le Peep, of course, was a hit - and continues to be so today - and it wasn't long before Sullivan opened more locations in the greater Denver area. Many of the dishes at LePeep were egg-based because eggs were more of a stable commodity than beef was at the time. In 1963, Sullivan started Le Peep, one of the first - if not the first - upscale bistro-style restaurants that focused on early and mid-day dining only. He chose the ski village community of Aspen to open his restaurant. He hated the long hours and wanted to try a concept of a breakfast place that focused on just breakfast, brunch and lunch that would close in the mid-afternoon. John Sullivan was living in Denver in the late 50's and early 60's managing a steak and seafood restaurant. But I had no idea the extent of the number of First Watch locations. I had seen First Watch restaurants in some of my travels, mainly on vacations to the South and Mountain West. I told him to name the place and he suggested we meet at First Watch, a breakfast/lunch bistro located in the new Streets of West Pryor mixed-use development in Lee's Summit. We made plans for a breakfast meeting near his home in Lee's Summit, MO just outside of Kansas City. He and I had been in talks about picking up some of my lines and he was getting ready to open his doors last fall. ![]() A guy who had worked for one of my accounts for over 20 years had made a monumental decision last summer to leave that store and open his own store on the opposite end of Kansas City. ![]()
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