Quality and Value

I know that Jake's has always been known mainly for quantity but ever since I took it over, I have strived to change that focus. I would much rather it be known for it's quality and value. I also feel that those factors along with service will be the best answer to get us through these hard times.

Along with our great staffs help, Judy and I strive daily to maintain those factors. When we are there, you will see us busing tables and pouring coffee. We constantly looking for problems to hopefully solve them before the customer leaves the building. I know that while that is always important, it is even more important in these present times.

Jimmy and I are constantly looking for ways to upgrade our quality without affecting the price. In the past year, he has greatly improved that in his roasting of our own roast beef, pot roast, and turkey. He also cuts all of the steaks and tweaks the various recipes to improve them such as our clam chowder of which I would put alongside any ones. In Oregon, Moe's is the standard and I have had many people tell me that ours is so much better. I do know that it is creamier and has more clams and vegetables in it.

But we are not and never will be fancy. That is not what we are here for and we know it.

Our hardest times as is with many others in town is in the evenings. It would be easier and more profitable for us to just close down at 3PM as others have but we will continue to work to improve those hours rather than give them up if anything so that people do not lose their jobs in a time when so many others are. We did decide to close down the Sunday evenings but that decision came after the crews desire to close it up also. That decision has been a good one for us also in that it gives us a time when we can easier get maintenance done (carpets and hoods) and also gives us a place in the week for special events if we want to such as an up coming spaghetti feed to help build the veteran memorial by the river on Newport Ave.

Our Thursday night steak and Saturday night prime rib is beginning to be successful but is constantly being watched and adjusted. Recently, we have been cutting the prime into rib eye steaks also and giving the customers the option of on Thursday, either top sirloin or rib eye and on Saturday, either prime or rib eye.

Jimmy is now playing with some roasted chicken on Wednesdays. We tried it last week and nearly sold out. He was planning on making the unsold portions into a chicken catchatori on Thursday but ended up with only enough to make some really great rosemary chicken rice soup that sold out quickly.

We will also continue to give back and support the community in every way that we can. Our present MOW (middle of winter) clothing, blanket and food drive has brought in over fifty large garbage size bags of coats and blankets, five sleeping bags, and six grocery bags full of food that is being distributed through the Salvation Army.

As I stated before, we will be holding a spaghetti feed for the veteran memorial here in the near future. And we will be holding the same events in this year as we have in the past with Holdem for Habitat on Monday nights (although with the changes that the Justice dept have imposed which reduces the intake from what we made before), the Fourth of July BBQ for the VVA, and our biggest event of the year which is the Thanksgiving feast for Seniors. All that with directly supporting a variety of things in the community such as Volunteers for Medicine, Hospice, Bend Police and Fire Chaplains, and many many others.

This along with our cater arm should keep us all pretty busy this year. At least that is our hope.