How Atlanta Breakfast Club emerged as the city’s premier breakfast establishment.
Atlanta Breakfast Club (ABC) is the city’s premier breakfast establishment, tourist attraction and shining example of how a black owned business can not only thrive, but expand under the leadership of passionate people.
Founder Chef Anthony Sanders and co-owner Osirus Ballard together have built “Good Food & Co”, a brand united by love, loyalty, and the dedication to food and hospitality.
ABC’s flagship location sits on Ivan Allen Jr. Boulevard, directly across from the Georgia Aquarium in the heart of Downtown Atlanta’s tourist and convention district. On any given day the line is out the door — sometimes around the corner — with hungry customers eager to enjoy a soulful southern breakfast.
The restaurant has firmly become a pillar in the community and a YELP favorite, however, the restaurants success didn’t happen overnight.
In 2016, Chef Anthony Sanders took over the restaurant owned by neighboring Suite Food Lounge, in hopes of resurrecting an establishment the previous owner wanted to get out from under; even pondering turning the location into a parking garage.
“One thing I know how to do is fill a restaurant with people, everything else I felt like if we got our foot in the door, that will work”
“One thing I know how to do is fill a restaurant with people, everything else I felt like if we got our foot in the door, that will work,” said Chef Sanders.
Sanders, who wasn’t working at the time, jumped at the opportunity, recruiting many of the people he established relationships with in the city to help him build the restaurant.
“I’ve been doing good food in this city since I got here,” said Chef Sanders who arrived in 2005 from Boca Raton, Florida, “I’ve always worked with the major players in the industry, always worked at the top level restaurants, always been top of the food chain.”
At acquisition, the business was upside down by almost 80k, averaging anywhere between 40-50 nsf’s a month.
“It was bad bruh,” said chef as he chucked saying the business looked like a “straight Lawsuit” in the developmental stages.
But chef stuck to the vision; cooking every egg while his two closest servers waited every table and served each guest to the fullest until they started generating customers and organically building a dedicated team.
“Chef is really good at recruiting his best players around him to complement him to make a championship team,” said Kelsey Maynor, who has been apart of the team since 2016.
It wasn’t until Chef Anthony met Osirus Ballard a few months into the venture that the company took the next major leap into prosperity.
“We’re really good at what we do, which is not sitting in the office doing paperwork,” said Maynor, “Osirus was that link that does everything we don’t do — helping clean up our books, organized the behind the scenes and put us in position to grow larger than we thought we could.”
As a seasoned veteran of corporate America with a background in finance and development consulting, Ballard’s specialty is rebranding companies.
He walked into the Breakfast Club with a friend one day and met Chef.
“The two of us started a dialogue,” said Ballard adding, “I saw someone who was genuine and my goal has always been to work with another ambitious bother, such as myself. ”
The relationship building process took months.
“Let’s face it, nobody wants someone who’s going to jump into your life for a season, leaves them with a bunch of crap, and then hits the road,” said Ballard, “It’s about understanding a persons commitment.”
Ballard learned as much as he could about chef and soon realized Sanders was a brilliant man who wasn’t too prideful and wanted to change the game on so many levels.
The two understood each other’s commitment was organic and pure and were both interested in creating something solid.
Despite the mutual admiration, chef warned Ballard in the beginning, “You know we’re not making enough money to pay either one of us,” but Ballard was all-in.
“I can’t explain it, all I know is that it existed and it pulled the two of us in the center of a constellation and that’s all she wrote,” said Ballard whose business acumen quickly turned the restaurant into the green within 6 months, ultimately freeing up chef to focus solely on what he loved most — the food.
Chef Sanders describes Atlanta Breakfast Club’s menu as Southern Indigenous Contemporary cuisine — incorporating ingredients that are indigenous to the area while using fine dining contemporary techniques in order to prepare them.
The menu features southern classics like chicken and waffles, shrimp and grits, and chef’s favorite dish, the peach cobbler French toast.
“It’s Atlanta, it’s peaches, it’s coca-cola, it’s brown sugar,” said chef who ultimately wants the food to exceed the expectations of the guest.
Guest travel from around the country and wait hours to dine at the breakfast club, who accommodates those guest with DJ’s who play eclectic music while they wait.
Resident DJ, Terrell (DJ Tabone) Williams acts as a ‘mood manager’, helping to lift the spirits of everyone who’s waiting with what chef calls, “The sound of food and the taste of music.”
“It doesn’t stop because you have a small amount of success, now you have to figure out how to build on success.”
The massive success of the original location has spawned the opening of ABC’s second location in September — Atlanta Breakfast Club Chicken and Waffles Nitro Coffee Counter.
Located on historic Auburn Avenue, the new restaurant features a condensed menu centered around the chicken and waffles and a new phenomenon, Nitro Coffee.
Phoenix Roasters’ patented nitro infusion technology transforms any flat beverage into a unique craft drink — Imagine converting an Arnold Palmer into coffee, without the coffee taste.
“We took the best product of phoenix roasters, and paired it with the best primary product at Atlanta Breakfast Club to create concept of Chicken and Waffles Nitro Coffee Counter,” said Ballard.
Good Food & Co. is bringing good food, unique coffee and economic viability back onto the once flourishing block of Black Atlanta.
Now the assistant general manager, Kelsey Maynor has been tasked to lead the new location. Everyday he works to get people to come back to the historical black business area by offering something fresh and new.
“Our goal is to get bigger and better,” said Maynor, “As of right now we’re celebrating the fact that we’re open and that we’re having people come in here but the next opportunity is to get the boarded windows off of Auburn Avenue, get the trash off of Auburn Avenue and get the life back on Auburn Avenue.”
“Our goal is to get bigger and better.”
- Kelsey Maynor, Assistant General Manager.
Atlanta Breakfast Club’s success is due to a culmination of experiences, teamwork, hospitality and a quality product consistently delivered to its customers. Their humble but meticulous beginnings laid the foundation of a thriving and expanding business.
“We built the things around us without ever taking a dime or a loan from anybody,” said Osirus Ballard, “All we did was reinvest in ourselves month after month and that's where it really began to take shape.”
The breakfast club provides guest from across the country with a savory meal and an unforgettable experience.
Senior general manager Ernest Griffin says, “When you come through this door, you’re going to be treated like royalty.”
The restaurant values building relationships which in turn creates lasting opportunities for growth and evolution — for everyone.
“You have to build something that truly outlives you,” said Ballard adding, “At this point in our lives it’s all about how many people we can enrich and how many people we can be a blessing too.”