2005-10-23 :: 10:10 a.m.
Laura's in the paper!

I love you, Sissy!

Harbaugh's little restaurant is now a Carbondale landmark

BY: NICOLE SACK
THE SOUTHERN
CARBONDALE - When it came time to erect the polka-dot awning, a name had to be chosen for the little restaurant on Illinois Avenue. The signmaker was getting impatient.

"What do you want to call this place, lady?"

All creativity was blocked. Nothing clever came to mind, but it was time to decide. Tick-tock, tic-tock - "Harbaugh's."

It is a quirky little place where you can sit on a church pew, pour your own flavored coffee and wait for a Carbondale city councilman to cook your eggs.

Within the five years of its operations, Harbaugh's has gone past being simply a restaurant to now being recognized as a Carbondale landmark. Nestled at the gateway to the Strip and just a stone's throw from the Southern Illinois University campus, it is the place where city and students break bread and chow down ranch potatoes.

The magic happens each morning, but like all things special, it doesn't last forever. The scrumptious sizzle stops at 2 p.m.

While many have come to know the name on the sign, far fewer know about the restaurant's namesake.

Laura Harbaugh grew up Arlington Heights, where by the age of 4 she landed her first job. Once a month, she and her sister were paid 25 cents an hour to be noise makers. Her mother was a teacher and would conduct an exercise with her students to test their attunement with their surroundings.

"The kids would sit there while my sister and I made noises or walked around the room, then their task was to recall what activities went on during the session. It was about body awareness."

She went from pocketing $1 per month, to reeling in $5 an hour as one of her neighborhood's most requested babysitters. She stepped into the world of food service rather innocently when she worked in a pizza shop during her high school years.

At the age of 17, Harbaugh was a freshman attending SIUC. Her first major was exercise science. After some degree back-and-forth she graduated with bachelor's in hotel and recreation management. She left and returned to Carbondale, now with a fair share of restaurant experience under her belt.

While she was witnessing one evening at Quatro's Pizza, she literally began to do the math that would bring her to the conclusion that her own restaurant was within reach. Harbaugh figured if she could get only 69 customers to come into a restaurant per day, and then she would break even.

"I finally mustered up the courage to do it. I said to myself, 'Am I going to open a restaurant or am I going to be a waitress for the rest of my life?'" Harbaugh said before quickly adding. "Not that there is anything wrong with that."

With a $50,000 investment and some creativity, Harbaugh opened Harbaugh's in March 2000.

She said there was no need to reinvent the wheel when it came time to put the plan into action. She stuck to the basic principles of good, health-conscious food served at a comfortable restaurant.

One of the principles in decorating the restaurant was to do it on the cheap. Nothing matches inside the restaurant, where the theme is "anything goes." Harbaugh purchased most of the furniture from auctions and thrift shops. One of her favorite buys was a set of eight tables that cost a total of $5.

"They were ugly, but I have friends who are artists and they just painted them," Harbaugh said. "I bought all the equipment used. I knew I could replace it along the line. I never wanted to get stuck under the debt of furniture payments and then not have the restaurant be successful."

Harbaugh, a self-proclaimed chick-with-power-tools, did much of the work herself. What she couldn't do, she enlisted others to pitch in. The restaurant benefited by instantly adopting an authentic feeling of nostalgia, something that other establishments - such as Friday's and Applebee's - work feverishly to synthesize.

"There is a lot of Carbondale in Harbaugh's," she said. "People have a feeling that it is their restaurant."

Harbaugh spent so much time at the restaurant during the startup that she installed a shower in the back and placed a cot in the back office.

"When we first got started, I worked 187 days without a day off," Harbaugh said.

She worked every job from hostess, to bus boy, to cook, to the manager. She didn't have to explain her long hours to anyone but her dog.

"For a while people thought I was married to Lance (City Councilman Jack)," she laughed during an interview.

She not married. She's single and she's a Libra.

Harbaugh, 34, is a self-described loner. Loner, in Harbaugh's case, does not mean introverted. She's instantly likeable and without being boisterous, she can be wildly entertaining.

Starting a small business is always risky, and the chance of success is slim. According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, over 50 percent of small businesses fail in the first year and 95 percent fail within the first five years. Harbaugh's has sailed past both milestones. And by July 2003 an extension to the north end of the restaurant was added.

"They run a good business and they serve their client base very well, they know their constituents well. They serve good food and provide a great atmosphere," said Carbondale Mayor Brad Cole, whose favorite item on the menu is the grilled cheese and tomato sandwich. "I don't know about you, but if I ask for something special, they are always willing to whip it up."

Harbaugh's is not only food. There are political meet and greets, art shows, receptions. Andy McKenna breezed through Harbaugh's as he made an unsuccessful bid for U.S. Senate. He didn't get to go to Washington, but he was appointed as the Illinois Republican Party chairman - and got some coffee out of the experience.

It hasn't been all sunny-side-up skillets at the restaurant, though. There have been more than a fair share of broken eggs.

One of the more recent mishaps occurred in May 2004, the Saturday of graduation weekend - one of Carbondale's busiest. Somewhere in Carbondale a cuddly squirrel got himself into an electrical transformer. The furry fellow fried himself and simultaneously knocked out power to half the town.

Inside Harbaugh's the staff waited and waited for the power to come back on. The timing was terrible. Graduation weekend is a business bonanza for restaurants. Finally the decision came from Harbaugh. If the power wasn't back on by noon, they'd pack it up and head to the wine trail.

"Just as we were ready to go out the door, the electricity went back on," Harbaugh said. "Disasters are disasters and you try not to get caught up with it. You have to regroup and move along."

Having cleared many hurdles of entrepreneurship, which cut many others off at the knees, Harbaugh is eyeing further growth for the restaurant. The idea of a nighttime tapas bar is simmering in her mind.

Her other goal is strange when considering how much of herself - from her concept, to her name, to her sweat - is invested in the business.

"I want the restaurant to run without me," she said.