POCATELLO — Six months removed from celebrating his eatery’s 60th anniversary, Steve Piper has made the difficult decision to sell Buddy’s Italian Restaurant in Pocatello.
Piper says he officially signed over the business to a man who lives in the Salt Lake City valley on Sept. 3, though he will remain involved with the ownership transition for at least 30 days after the sale.
“I have mixed emotions,” Piper said about selling Buddy’s after running the business for over 50 years. “It’s going to be one of the hardest things I ever do leaving this place. Saying goodbye to all of our clientele and to the several generations of families who have become a part of Buddy’s is going to be so hard.”
Piper declined to name the person he is selling the restaurant to, but said the new owner has agreed to keep all the current staff and the original recipes that Piper’s grandmother and the first owners brought with them when they immigrated to Pocatello from Italy in the late 1920s.
“He is definitely going to preserve the Buddy’s legacy,” Piper said about the incoming owner.
Buddy Face, the restaurant’s namesake, and Bill Guido started Buddy’s in 1961. Guido became the sole owner in 1963 and then handed the restaurant down to Piper’s mother, Julie, in 1970. When she died in 1986, Piper assumed control and has been the owner ever since. Piper got his first start working in the restaurant at age 13 as a dishwasher in 1961.
Several factors contributed to Piper deciding to sell the business, including difficulties that arose because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but mostly because he is 73-years-old and has been a part of the business for the last 50 years.
Normally, Buddy’s would close at 9:30 p.m. on the weekdays and 10:30 p.m. on the weekends but a shortage of kitchen support staff has forced him to close the business two hours earlier every night for the last several months.
“We are still going through some of the difficulties associated with COVID-19,” Piper said. “We are struggling to get enough help, mostly in the kitchen. In fact, I am closing Buddy’s on Monday just to give the kitchen guys who have been working 12-hour shifts six days a week a chance to rest for two days in a row.”
Despite the shortage of workers interested in the service industry, Piper always knew this day would come eventually, and he’s looking forward to retirement, he said. Though Piper won’t be around daily to greet the many loyal customers Buddy’s has developed over the years, he says the restaurant will remain exactly how people remember it, from the décor, to the staff to the menu items.
“People keep telling me that I am due for this, but it doesn’t make it any less hard on me,” Piper said. “I just want to thank everyone for such a great run. Now it’s time to start enjoying life a little bit.”