Winnipeg's iconic Red Top Drive-In will stay the same, new owner says

A new owner might be taking over Red Top Drive-In, but aside from a different face behind front counter, don't expect anything else to change at the Winnipeg institution.

After more than 50 years of family ownership, current owner Red Top Vicky Scouras has decided it's time to move out of the restaurant business.

Well, sort of.

"As long as he needs me, I will be here," Scouras told CBC News Saturday, sitting on one of the restaurant's red-vinyl upholstered seats next to new owner Stavros Athanasiadis.

"And from there on I hope that the community will continue on supporting the Red Top in order to move forward and keep this family restaurant alive."

The decision to sell the iconic burger joint, which was opened in 1960 by Scouras' late husband John and his two brothers in 1960 after the trio immigrated to the city from Greece, was not an easy one for Scouras and comes after tragic events altered the family's original plans.

Tragedy strikes

When John died suddenly while on a trip to Greece in 2007, Scoura's son Peter stepped in to run the restaurant with his mother, who was grooming him to one day take over the business.

But those plans tragically changed when Peter, 33, drowned while in Costa Rica for a rugby tournament holiday with his team, the Wombats Rugby Club, in February 2017.

Scouras' other two children didn't want to take over the restaurant and she knew she would eventually have to let the bushiness go but it wasn't something she could in the months after Peter's death.

She says she needed the support of the Red Top's loyal base of regulars, who she calls family.

"I needed the restaurant, I needed the support of the people emotionally," she said. "I needed a reason to get up in the morning."

Once she was ready to start thinking about selling again, Scourassaid shestill didn't rush into the move she wanted to find a new owner who would continue the restaurant's tradition in the community.

'A special place'

Scourassaid she found exactly what she was looking for in Athanasiadis, a family friend who also owns the Santa Lucia Pizza restaurant on Corydon Avenue. With 25 years experience working at that family run business, he's also no stranger to the city's restaurant industry.

"This is a special place, it has a soul of its own," said Scouras.

"In my heart, I wanted a replacement that would get as close as possible to my son, Peter, and John.

"I looked and looked and looked and I feel very comfortable and good about the decision I made in Stavros I see the qualities that we had as a family to carry on the Red Top."

Athanasiadis, who immigrated to Winnipeg from Greece in 1992, saidhe's honoured to take over the reins of the iconic St. Mary's Roadrestaurant.

"I've been here as a customer before and I've been friends with the family for 25 years, so I always knew this place, but I never knew it was like this," he said "I'm very, very excited to be a part of it and very, very honoured to be the one chosen to the one chosen to continue the legacy."

Athanasiadis says he's taking an "if it's not broken, don't fix it" approach to the restaurant and willkeepall staff some who've worked at the Red Top for decades and will keep the same menu when he takes over ownership in the new year.

"Everybody knows Red Top," he said. "It has fantastic food and amazing clientele.

"Of course everything will stay the same."