One of Fairfield County”™s newest eateries is Cos Cob-based Wildacre Rotisserie, a fast casual restaurant focused on California-style rotisserie chicken. Restauranteur Ben Pote opened Wildacre Rotisserie in June when inflation was soaring to record highs and many existing restaurants were straining to survive in a rough economy.
But despite the economic challenges, Pote was undeterred in his mission.
“I think you have to be a little bit crazy to open a restaurant no matter what time or what the market conditions are,” he said. “There is a tremendous amount of opportunity right now, which is why I chose specifically to open up a restaurant now. Now, granted, things got a lot more complicated with the process of reopening the economy and inflation and Covid kind of coming and going, but for restaurants that are really willing to be thoughtful about the way that they”™re serving their food and reaching their customers in new creative ways while managing their costs, I still think it”™s a great time.”
Pote brings more than a decade of restaurant industry experience to Wildacre Rotisserie ”” he held leadership positions with several nationally renowned food brands, including director of development at Souvla in San Francisco, director of culinary innovation at Starbucks and, most recently, director of culinary strategy and culinary program manager at Sweetgreen. In scouting out locations for his new restaurant, he had a serendipitous happening that brought him to the 147 E. Putnam Ave. location.
“I”™ve been coming to Greenwich to visit family for years and we would pass this Starbucks site,” he recalled. “I would always say it”™s such a cool site that”™s really central. And as soon as it came up, I jumped ”” it”™s a free-standing building with a ton of exposure to the Post Road and Putnam and it”™s got its own dedicated parking. I couldn”™t really ask for more.”
While the local market is not lacking in restaurants, Pote believed that Wildacre Rotisserie can stand out from the crowd.
“There”™s no one really doing what we”™re doing today,” he explained. “You can go somewhere to get a rotisserie chicken, or you can go somewhere else to get a salad, or you can go somewhere else to get prepared sides. But you can”™t really get all of that in one place presented in such a way that we”™re doing it, which is kind of cool.”
Pote added that he was seeking to move the concept of fast casual rotisserie beyond the Boston Market model.
“I”™m out to change the paradigm of rotisserie chicken and rethink the idea of the modern rotisserie, where we”™re making everything in house, using fresh vegetables and using this really beautiful core product, which is our chicken,” he said, noting that his chickens are pasture-raised, heirloom birds fed a diet of non-GMO feed. “You can really taste the difference and, luckily, people respond to it really well.”
One hiccup that Pote has experienced since starting is a problem facing the restaurant industry as a whole: a labor shortage of restaurant workers that has grown since the pandemic began to wind down.
“Pre-labor shortage, if you put a hiring post out there, you”™d get maybe 30 to 50 applicants depending on the rate that you”™re hiring at for the position,” he said. “We did not have any kind of meaningful intake of applicants, maybe one or two a day. And of those applicants, we would set up an interview and I would say with one out of three interviews that we set up, the person would just not even show up.”
However, Pote added that he has been “very fortunate in that the people that we did hire are great, and we have not had a ton of turnover, like a lot of new restaurants do.”
Looking forward, Pote hoped to build the Wildacre Rotisserie brand with additional locations. But for the moment, he is focused on his first outpost.
“My priority is connecting with the community and making sure that we”™re serving our community delicious food all the time,” he said. “Then, we can start thinking about more after that.”
