Reardon's: A cut above
Fourth generation joins the business
May 01, 2010
Mary K. Nolan
The Hamilton Spectator
http://www.thespec.com/News/Business/article/761548
To commerce gurus who insist that family businesses do not survive a third generation, Paul Reardon has this to say: "Meet my daughter."
When 25-year-old Katie Reardon starts work today at her parents' King William Street shop, she becomes the fourth generation of Reardons in the family butchery.
It's a remarkable development, considering the business almost didn't make it past the founding brothers, Fred and Bert.
Immigrants from County Cork, Ireland, the boys opened Reardon Bros. Butchers at the Hamilton Farmers' Market in 1912.
When the market burned down five years later, they relocated in a shop at York and Bay streets and carried on.
Fred was about as keen to have his son, Jack, working for him as Jack was ... that is, not at all.
"My dad didn't want to take over from my grandfather," says Paul. "He wanted to be an accountant."
But when Jack was overseas during the Second World War, his father died of a heart attack.
"When he came home, his mother told him he was taking over the business and those were the days when people listened to their mothers," says Paul.
So Jack dutifully donned the butcher's apron and joined his uncle Bert behind the counter.
There was another move -- to York and MacNab in 1930 -- where Reardon's continued to build its reputation for quality meats and butchering.
On Bert's death in the early 1950s, Jack changed the name of the enterprise to Reardon's Meat Market, which was uprooted yet again by the construction of Jackson Square.
So Jack cast his eye a littler further east and reopened on King William Street at Hughson in 1970.
And then history repeated itself. When Jack was 68, he announced at dinner one night that he was retiring and, as none of his four boys was interested in the butcher trade, would be closing the shop.
That's when his eldest son, Paul -- visiting from Toronto where he was a well-established restaurateur -- surprised him with an offer to take over.
By the time Paul started in 1984, the Right House had already closed. Then Mills' China, the Chicken Roost, Zellers, Robinson's ... there was a bus strike, a steelworkers' strike ... "It was brutal. I was asking myself, 'What the hell did I do?'"
But the resourceful Paul, who'd already set up a popular sausage cart outside the store, responded by selling sandwiches.
(His own favourite is bologna on white bread with zucchini relish.)
He started with three stools, graduated to tables a few years later and, eventually, expanded into the back half of a neighbouring store to accommodate the booming lunch trade.
The deli proved to be Reardon's salvation and has been so successful that it now comprises half the business. It's run by Paul's wife, Karen, who makes most of the dishes herself for small weddings, showers, meetings, receptions and other special events.
"Until about two years ago, I was like my dad," says the affable Paul. "I never talked to my kids about taking over the business, never pressured them. I never really thought about the long term. I was too busy thinking about surviving today."
So it was a complete surprise when young Katie announced she'd like to come aboard.
"I told her there might not be much future for a place like this, but she wanted to take a stab at it," says Paul.
At his insistence, she completed the chef's course at George Brown College and will be learning the butcher biz from her dad while managing the deli with her mother.
"We'll just keep doing it the way we do it and see how it goes," says Paul. "Then we'll talk new ideas."
In the meantime, another move for Reardon's seems inevitable. The lease is up on the cosy but tired premises Reardon's has occupied for 40 years, but Paul promises he's staying downtown.
"We're down here, we've always been down here and this is where we're going to stay."
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