Page 39 - 2017-01-02

PARTNERS IN BUSINESS & LIFE
CINDY & VINCE GREINER
Cindy Greiner: Oh, we stayed at the Holiday Inn at the other end of the beach. It was beautiful, even then it was beautiful. It wasn't that long of a drive for us from Fort Benning, it was a nice getaway. Then we just started coming down. Eventually we bought a condo and later we bought a house and moved here full time in 2008.
PC Living: Was it tough to start a new life in Panama City Beach?
Cindy Greiner: I worked for a Pediatric Neurosurgery group in Atlanta for many years. It was harder for me to set the date and say ‘let’s go’.
Vince Greiner: Finally the tra c got to her. We just packed up and moved down.
PC Living: How did you nd this place?
Vince Greiner: Friends of ours had restaurants. PC Living: Isn't that a deterrent usually?
Vince Greiner: Yeah. The thing was, we thought it was just a quiet little corner pub... a very small business. I envisioned a business plan that had me bartending on Saturday and Sunday afternoons for happy hour.
PC Living: Well, you're busier than you thought.
Cindy Greiner: Yeah, much, much busier. Which is a good thing.
Vince Greiner: There were horror stories in the beginning, We cleaned it up and hired an excellent chef, Craig Miller. He used to
work for Canopies and 30 Degree Blue restaurants. Cindy Greiner: He really, really turned it around.
Vince Greiner: It was a lot of hard work in the beginning. Because when we moved here, I was still working in sales. Even when we bought it, I was working in sales and she worked for a doctor here in town. I quit my job to run Patches full time and she continued working because we had no idea if we would be successful.
Cindy Greiner: You don't throw all your eggs in one basket.
Vince Greiner: Finally, it just got to be too much to where Cindy was
able to quit her job, and we were both full time.
PC Living: Who's responsible for what in the business, and how do you work together?
Cindy Greiner: I mainly do the day-to-day operations. I'm the money person, Vince is the marketing person. It works.
PC Living: Do you have to work on certain items together?
Cindy Greiner: Oh sure, absolutely. We develop many event ideas together, like our turkey bowl. We also do the pub crawl and many events throughout the year. I want to keep everyone guessing what's next.
Vince Greiner: We have 161 seats. The biggest point is when we bought this we had six part-time employees, now we have 42 full time, year-round employees. Our general manager Darleen Vanderveen is
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