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TriMark RobertClark |
Exterior of Mimi's Café
Interior of Mimi's Café | |||
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"TriMark RobertClark knows their business and they know ours," exclaimed Steven Carter, Director of Construction for Mimi's in a recent interview. "We've been working with them for 14 years. They're always on the watch for new products that can help us improve our service to our customers and they have the creativity to customize existing products to make them work better for us." Back last January, Mimi's started talking to TriMark RobertClark's Bob Heimstra about plans for the kitchen design for their new restaurant prototype. They wanted to go with a display kitchen with an integrated pantry, but ran into a problem with the finish on Mimi's signature French Market Onion Soup. To complete the dish, they needed to melt and brown the gruyere on top of the soup, but the pantry area where they wanted to prepare the dish was prohibitively far from the range hoods and fire protection equipment. TriMark RobertClark introduced Mimi's to the Hatco Thermal Finisher, which could provide the finish on the dish that they needed, although it didn't quite work in the available space. TriMark called in the product designers at Hatco and together they re-engineered the Thermal Finisher to fit in the desired location. What they came up with solved the problem and enabled Mimi's to go forward with the open pantry which they felt was integral to the new restaurant's kitchen layout. A big part of the challenge of Mimi's new restaurant design involves meeting ever stricter health code requirements while maintaining efficient utilization of the space. "Wherever possible we're trying to keep the refrigerated storage areas within arms reach of the food preparation staff while still preserving effective contamination barriers between hot and cold food items. TriMark had to come up with creative uses of custom fabricated equipment to maximize the efficiency of the kitchen space for our staff and conform to the both to the health department's requirements and our need to ensure a productive cookline and chefs area," said Steven. Steven continues, "We have very specific requirements for our equipment. It has to work well and it has to last. TriMark helps us design solutions that increase the efficiency of our work areas, custom fabricate the individual pieces and of course handle the installation. Last year alone they did 14 installations for us. Arizona, Oklahoma, Kansas, Florida, Colorado, Utah, California, Nevada, New Mexico -- coast to coast. Their on-site welding, fabrication and finishing are far superior to anyone else we've ever worked with. When we started working with TriMark we were a 2-state 22-location chain, now we're in 12 states with almost 100 locations. "We depend on them for keeping us current on the latest information in the industry; designing solutions for our unique needs; and installing durable, reliable equipment that lets us focus on serving our customers." Steve Carter TriMark RobertClark |
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