My father bought the bar in 1990. He hired my mother to run it. She just recently passed away, so I’ve taken over. For so many years, it was a Ford bar. Everybody who works there now is from Lordstown or Sandusky. It doesn’t help this community except for the gas stations. Who wants to stop and have a drink before they have to drive an hour home?
When we first took over, Ford made this place. It was a beautiful thing. They had three shifts full of employees. They had everything up and running. Now they have one plant left out of three. The plant down on the end is totally isolated and abandoned and emptied. Now, we maybe have five customers out of there. My mom was old and sick, and didn’t try to venture into new business. That is my intention — finding new people. We have been promoting it, and I’ve been trying to do it through food.
We’ve made a lot of changes. We do a lot of benefits, and we reach out to the community. We have done celebrity bartender contests with $2,000 prize money, because it gets people in the door we haven’t had thus far. We’ve come a long way, but we’re still struggling. Nobody has room for mom and pop shops anymore. We’re doing everything we can.
