Free Pie in the Sky
by Michael McCullough
When the City of Lethbridge planned to demolish its obsolete, 1.9-million-litre water tower in 2000, local developer Douglas Bergen stepped in with a scheme to cut windows into the steel tank and turn it into a restaurant.
Four years later, Ric’s Grill opened at the highly visible crossroads of Highways 3 and 5 and is today one of the busiest outlets in the B.C.-based chain of 16 steakhouses, just behind the money-spinning Whistler location. Still, running an eatery 30 metres above the street has its challenges, says operations manager Cathy Wilson. When the elevator broke down last March, Wilson met patrons at the entrance and issued them a challenge. “I said anybody who’s willing to do the stairs, we’d buy them a drink or a dessert when they got to the top,” she says. “Pretty much everybody came up.”
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