Interview with a Retailer: Flip Burger boutique in Atlanta
One of my favorite neighborhood spots of Flip Burger boutique. It’s a mere block from my house and the landmark by which I reference where I live now (as no one seems to have heard of Berkeley Park but everyone seems to have heard of Flip). The place is mad crazy busy all the time (it’s business time all the time, you could say) but the owner Barry and manager Sebastian sat down with me during a slight lull one afternoon to answer a few questions.
1. We’ve all seen the tremendous success of flip, I go by here almost every day and it’s rare that during lunch or dinner there is not some sort of line spilling out the front door onto the sidewalk. What has been the biggest challenge of this success you’ve seen?
Barry: Typically a restaurant has time to get used to doing what they do and they can do that comfortably as they gradually get busier. Right out of the starting gates it was very busy and we had to learn quickly. Now the challenge is how do we keep this feel where it is independent and hip and the quality is there with the eccentricities that make this place great — how do we duplicate that and transition into another location. The lines are getting shorter as the kitchen gets better and the food has gotten better but it’s allowed us to shorten the lines.
How has flip marketed itself?
Barry: We’ve done zero marketing and I haven’t spent a penny on any type of advertising. And we like that grassroots approach because it’s genuine. There’s nothing worse than contrived advertising. That’s been the most rewarding thing as we’ve gotten busier and busier and to know that it’s because we’re doing a good job and people are enjoying the experience.
While you’re definitely not a beer place, you have a nice list that’s not standard fare. One of my friends (with inferior beer preferences) recently ate at flip, and while normally a Miller/Bud kind of guy, the waiter talking him into trying Three Philosophers and he loved it. What types of things do you take into account when building a beer menu?
Sebastian: Our first thought was to make sure we have the local Atlanta beers – Sweetwater and ABC, then we wanted to cover the oldest of US breweries, which is Yeungling, and really is considered a staple for many people. And from there our list is not that big so we looked for flavors that complement our food. I wanted to do it with as many craft breweries from the US as made sense. We have the Full Sail session, which is a lager but made to be a pre-prohibition style and they also put it in this stubbly bottle like it used to be. We’re not trying to be the cutting edge, but we want to give them some interesting beers.
Barry: My top priority is for everything to have synergies. I want everything including the beer to complement the menu. We try to keep it outside the typical box of what you expect in a restaurant, we try and do burgers that no one really has and have the beer menu complement thats. I want there be a wow factor behind everything we do.
Waitress pops in and says “So you’re saying I’m different than what anyone else has”
Barry: I know you’re different? in a bad way (Everyone laughs)
You seem to care about this community (Berkeley Park) and this city. They say location is everything but how did you pick this spot?
We know we wanted to be in some sort of up-and-coming area and in a free-standing location, but honestly it’s a bit of luck that we ended up in this location. It’s perfect though, and creates a bit of an oasis where you have all of auto repair shops and then there is flip and it just intuitively felt right. I’m super happy that the neighborhood has embraced it and that I see all of you in here and that we get that support.
Atlanta is a very loyal market. There are a lot of big New York chefs and they’ve really struggled getting into this market, but I’ve spent my whole career in this city and I think my time here has paid off, not only in how it’s helped us do things the right way but in the ways the community has supported us.
Flip has done a great job dressing up accessible fare, bridging the gap between the normal and the gourmet. It reminds me of what a lot of microbreweries are doing, creating accessible “stepping stone” beers, like Sweetwater 420. Have you seen a trend in Atlanta towards gourmet food, and if so what do you think is behind that trend and how do you see it evolving?
Absolutely. You have Top Chef, Food Network, and all of these things bring chef-driven dining, as well as more complicated foods to the masses. The whole idea behind flip was that I’ve got 15 years experience in fine dining (as does Sebastian) and it’s very disconnected from the mass market. But it doesn’t need to be. You know, it’s stuffy, it can be stale. There was this huge vacuum in the market. You have fast food and fast casual, and fast casual is really just food as cheap as you can make it that you just dress up a little bit. I wanted to create a restaurant that had, at its core, the hipness but with the ingredients of a fine dining restaurant, but making it all much more approachable. So instead of dark environment we’ve made this a really light high energy environment. Really flip isn’t about burgers. It’s about high quality fine dining food for $15/head vs. $40 or $50 a head. I just chose the burger because I thought it was a very approachable medium? It’s just two buns and what can you stick between them. Well you can stick lobster sorbet in there. You can do whatever and Richard [Blaise] really complements that because he really thinks outside the box.
What’s your favorite beer/burger pairing on the menu?
I’d say the UFO Hefeweizen with the tuna burger. You have that slightly citrus flavor that’s fresh and it complements the spiciness of the tuna perfectly. I like the nuttiness of the Newcastle with the RB que burger.
Barry: I’m a Stella drinker at heart. So Stella and any of the above.
When will we see more locations?
2nd one is definitely in the works and hopefully a 3rd at some point. Next one will probably be somewhere over on the Eastside.
Image courtesy of CodePoet5150
Great article, nice to see the burger guys getting a shout-out. I maintain that Burgers are a great beersnack. nice work, guys. and the food looks great.
mmm, I am now craving a burger at 9:55 AM. There is one in Birmingham that my cousins ate at last night. They loved it too…glad to see this place do so well :)
Blais gets a one-sentence mention in all of this? It was Blais’s reputation that got the foodies out there on Day 1 and started the buzz that brought the masses in.
This place is just a yuppie “trendy” spot short on good burgers, but big on pretense. I’m glad that all the yuppies from Midtown and ATL Station go there because they’ll stay away from the good burgers to be had at Vortex and other burger places. Who wants to pay $10.00 for a mediocre yuppie burger and have to rub elbows with a bunch of image-conscious neo-socialists. I swear I heard a yuppie mention to his buddy that he’d have to pick up Granola on the way home and the guy asked where, so he said she’s at daycare.
Oh, the food’s just as pretensiously bad also.
Lorenzo, I think that’s a fair point. Blais was how I originally heard about Flip as well. You don’t have to spend as much money on advertising when your “Top Chef” is a PR machine.