Entrepreneur planning to bring ‘Bacon, Bourbon & Beer’ to Park Place
Opening his bar/restaurant before Halloween would be a treat for Shawn Janovich, a 1993 Washington High School graduate.
Bacon, Bourbon & Beer will locate on the right of the building going up at Park Place. The bar/restaurant also will feature outdoor dining in the space between the two structures.
Shawn Janovich has an easy, broad smile that – ever so slightly – betrays his mischievous past.
“I was a punk kid,” he said Tuesday, three weeks shy of his 40th birthday. “I was probably not easy for most of my teachers to deal with. I wasn’t as good of a student as I should have been.”
Janovich said he underachieved in the Washington School District and at West Virginia University, laughing at academic transgressions that didn’t prevent him from graduating. Then, as the dialogue segued to his new business endeavor, his tone turned serious.
“It could be tough, but it is something I want to do,” he said. “I’ve never been shy of risk. I’m going to go all in on this.”
‘This’ is Bacon, Bourbon & Beer, a bar/restaurant in its formative stages. It is targeted for Park Place at the Meadow Lands, on the right side of the building currently being erected off Route 19 near Racetrack Road.
There is a lot of work ahead, structurally and legally, including a liquor license transfer hearing July 21 before the North Strabane Township supervisors. But Janovich, who has signed a 10-year lease in Park Place, is optimistic that his establishment will open in October, making it a happy homecoming for the Wash High grad, class of ’93.
“I’m ready to do something more upscale,” he said. “I don’t want this to be a place for 21-year-olds willing to party, seeing how much they can consume. This is not going to have frozen chicken tenders or a burger patty being microwaved. We’re looking at this as a bar, but with a chef-driven menu, a place where people will want to come and eat.”
And drink. “We will have over 20 taps, over 50 types of bourbon,” Janovich said.
He selected Bacon, Bourbon & Beer because of its alliteration, a literary device favored by one of his teachers – the memory indicating that Janovich may have been a better student than he contends.
BB&B will be in the first building of the second phase of this project, which is being developed by Dave Biafora of Morgantown, W.Va.-based Metro Property Management. Janovich’s establishment will have 2,688 square feet on the first floor with another 800 for outdoor dining – in the vacant space between that building and the existing one, home of Tender Care Learning Center, Napoli’s and other businesses.
Janovich plans to hire 20-plus and be open 11 a.m. to 2 a.m. daily. He said he has a minority partner, identifying the individual only as Will.
Though he is confident and excited about this venture, Janovich is aware of that risk he mentioned. Starting a business can be a challenge, especially if you have a family. He and his wife, Maria, live in Robinson Township, Allegheny County, with daughter Ashley, 8, and son Eli, 5.
But he is an experienced businessman. After graduating from WVU, where he met his wife, Janovich took a sales job for a delivery company in Washington, D.C. “I was driving more than I was selling.”
He said he “took $1,000 and a Subaru” and started his own delivery business. “My car was my office, my lunch room, everything. “I brought a friend on and we grew it.”
Grew it to where they could afford office space, six company cars and a staff of 20 independent contractors. Janovich ran that company for 8 1/2 years before selling it and returning to the Pittsburgh area. He bought a small bar on the city’s South Side, which he operated for four-plus years before selling.
“My first venture into the bar business was a great learning experience,” Janovich said. “I look at it as my training. There were many nights when I’d work till 4 a.m. and get up at 6. But if you want to do what you love, you sacrifice.”
For his second bar venture, Janovich said he “looked everywhere” in Southwestern Pennsylvania “and couldn’t get a deal in place.” Then the Park Place possibility arose.
“My friends in Allegheny County said Washington County won’t work. I said, ‘Why not?'
“This developer wants us,” Janovich said of Biafora. “He’s great to work with. But I’d never bid on new construction before. I am dealing with an architect and such.”
Apparently, his kids are picking up his business acumen. “Ashley wants to be the business manager right now – at 8,” Janovich said. “Eli wants to be a pastry chef so he can eat everything.”
Eli’s dad is pleased to be back in the Washington area again, where he grew up with three brothers and a sister, where he ran track and cross country for Wash High, where times have been good. If they are at BB&B, Janovich said he eventually would like to open a second site. The work, after all, is appealing.
“I have a great family and, fortunately, I can do what I want to do for a living. How many people can say that?”