“From Beloved Beacon to Forgotten Relic: Unraveling the Astonishing Decline of Howard Johnson’s Empire”
On top of this, on the inside, he eventually hired famed interior designer Dorothy May Kinnicutt Parish, aka Sister Parish, perhaps most famous today for her work in the White House, to set the inside look. He also ultimately hired Christian Dior to design his waitress outfits, and fast-forwarding a bit to 1961 hired famed chefs Pierre Franey and Jacques Pepin, the latter of which turned down an offer to work as JFK’s personal chef in the White House to instead work on perfecting the Howard Johnson’s menu.
On this note of hiring Franey and Pepin, Johnson instituted a system of having his head corporate chefs start by working the line at actual restaurant locations to get a feel for everything, then come up with the best staple products they could, and then figure out how to freeze them for reheating and final preparation at the actual locations. In all accomplishing this via a sort of central commissary to make it easier and cheaper for all the restaurants in the chain to get their needed meals, while minimizing the need for skilled chefs, but still ensuring the exact same quality and product regardless of location.
On top of that, he created the Howard Johnson’s Bible outlining in incredible detail how every facet of the restaurant should be run and food prepared so everything was perfectly consistent from location to location.
Again, the idea being, if you went to any Howard Johnson’s, you’d get exactly what you expected based on whatever you were familiar with at your home Howard Johnson’s.
