King Phillip welcomes new owner

Twoheys officially hand off beloved local business after nearly 40 years

PHILLIPSTON — The restaurant might have a new owner, but diners at the King Phillip Restaurant will not notice any immediate changes, according to Harshal Patel, who officially took over the reins of the venerable local establishment at the end of July.

Patel, who owns a sports bar in Littleton, said he was attracted to the King Phillip because of its strong local ties to the community.

“I’m not interested in chain restaurants because they are too corporate,” Patel explained. “I wanted to have a business that is locally owned and independent, and I wanted something that has a good New England feel.”

When he learned the King Phillip was for sale, Patel said he stopped in to have a steak dinner. He enjoyed the experience so much he decided to make an offer to buy the establishment.

The King Phillip was previously owned by Craig Twohey and his wife, Jean, who took over the restaurant in 1983. He said the couple decided to try their hand at running a restaurant because they were “young and foolish” nearly 40 years ago.

“We had a dream of running our own place. The place became available because it had fallen on hard times, so we saw an opportunity and came in and took it over,” Twohey said.

After a lot of renovations, including buying new equipment and repairing the building, the new King Phillip Restaurant opened for business and was quickly embraced by the community.

“Business grew, so we added on a big kitchen in 1988,” Twohey said. “Business grew some more, so we added on this lounge area and a 100-seat banquet area downstairs in 1997.”

Twohey said one of the challenges of operating a successful restaurant was keeping up with the changing trends in the dining industry.

“When we opened in 1983, dining out was more of a special occasion — the restaurant industry wasn’t as broad as it is today,” he said. “Nowadays, people are (eating) out three of four times a week, so we have people who come in here for dinner one night, then they might come in for appetizers on other nights — so we’ve tried to serve every facet of people’s dining needs.”

Patel said any possible changes he might make to the restaurant are years away.

“Five years from now, I might update some things like the decor, but still the food and everything else I will keep the same — I’m not going to change the core menu,” Patel said. “We still offer a bit of high-end dining, with a focus on the main things like seafood and steak.” He said he will retain the services of two chefs who have each been with the restaurant for nearly two decades.

The establishment, which started out as an ice cream stand more than 70 years ago on busy Route 2A, had evolved into a luncheonette before becoming a restaurant and a motel with six units in the mid-1950s. The business was successful until the early 1980s, when an increase in national unemployment meant fewer people could afford to go out to eat on a regular basis. By then, the building had fallen into a state of disrepair, according to Twohey.

“When we bought the place it was a big joke — when it rained, (we had to) have buckets along the old bar catching water because the roof was leaking,” Twohey said. “The motels were basically show; you could basically look up and see through the roof. We pretty much needed to repair and replace everything. This is the type of business you have to constantly be reinvesting in.”

But he said the efforts to keep the King Phillip open paid off, and the restaurant eventually established a group of loyal customers. Twohey said one of the keys to his success was keeping the focus of the restaurant local.

“With marketing nowadays, (restaurants) have to constantly be advertising on social media, but we still used local media like the newspapers,” he said.

Twohey, who said he and his wife were looking forward to their retirement and enjoying their “golden years,” said he was pleased to see the community welcome Patel as the new owner of the King Phillip. Patel said he appreciates the response he’s been given, even though he’s owned the restaurant for only a short time.

“I’ve gotten a really good feeling from everybody that I’ve met,” Patel said. “People are really good in this community.”

The Twoheys hosted a meet-and-greet event on Monday, Aug. 5, to introduce diners to the new owner, and to officially hand over the reins of the restaurant to Patel.

“People are always nervous when there’s an ownership change — they want to make sure it’s going to be the place they’ve loved for all these years — so we’re trying to get everyone in here to let them know that, yeah, it’s going to be the same place,” Twohey said.