Boardwalk Vegan brings plant-based taste to Delco
HAVERFORD » Amid the bright, vivid decor and the fabulous fun food beckoning the best of the Jersey Shore, Boardwalk Vegan has emerged from the depths of anguish.
Wanting to continue to bring people joy, Kris and Randy Sumey opened the plant-based eatery at 28 N. Manoa Road this week after COVID-19 all but wiped away their awardwinning special events business, Event FX Productions Inc.
“So this was sor t of something that was built, was inspired and born out of despair,” Kris Sumey said.
Of Event FX, she said, “We started in our house, in our bedroom 18 years ago and consistently every year, we grew and we grew and we grew. The whole thing was about making people happy. That was the one thing about our job, about our events.”
They eventually moved from their bedroom to a
7,000 square-foot space to a 40,000 square-foot that included their own in-house florist and printmaking shop and housed every thing they needed for special events from lighting to linens to props in a corporate development in Sharon Hill.
Challenges began to surface last year for the two when Kris’s dad and dog died, then Randy was diagnosed with colon cancer
Even as the business continued to produce
800-person events at the Borgata and VIP events for the Thanksgiving Day parade, Randy had his surgery in November. Up through Valentine’s Day, Event FX did a huge event for the Hard Rock Casino on Valentine’s Day.
Then COVID-19 hit. “The whole industry, its devastating,” Sumey said. “The whole entire industry has literally had the bottom drop out. All the events are canceled for the whole year, $1 million. We had to furlough everybody.”
For two to three months, Sumey said she was extremely depressed and couldn’t even get out of bed.
Then, she and Randy tried to launch EFX at Home as they tried to save it somehow. “There’s just no business,” she said as her eyes teared up.
She said Event FX still exists although everything’s up in the air, especially with $14,000-amonth for their Sharon Hill facility.
“We go in there, it ’s nothing but crickets right now,” she said. “It’s really depressing. It’s one day at a time. We’re trying to work with the landlord but it’s not looking good.”
Sumey explained how she and Randy became vegans.
Three years ago, their health was dif ferent - Randy had diabetes and she had high cholesterol and high blood pressure.
“We were both much more overweight than we are now,” she said. “We watched this documentary called ‘Forks Over Knives’ and we woke up one day and he’s like, ‘L et ’s go shopping.’ We just stocked up things and we went completely plant-based.”
The results were dramatic.
“It was great … our blood pressure and our cholesterol and our diabetes sort of went away in two months – just from food,” Sumey said. “We were blown away by it.”
Over the COVID quarantine, they missed being at the shore and the boardwalk, so they started creating some of their favorites at home, making plant-based versions of the foods that used to make them happy, including funnel cake and waffles and ice cream.
Then they had a thought.
“People can’t get away, people really want to go to the shore, people don’t want to be around crowds, got it,” Sumey said. “We love making people happy. We love being at the shore. We were dual residents of Ocean City and Havertown. Thanks to COVID, we only have one home now. We’re living on 30 percent of our income with 100 percent of our bills.”
Kris said for months, they received no unemployment money and she’s still having difficulties accessing her funds.
Living nearby on Park Avenue, she was driving past the location on Manoa Road and thought about opening up the vegan eatery.
“L et ’s just build this and make people happy.” she said.
So they went for it.
“If it made it on the menu,” she said of the fare at Boardwalk. Vegan, “it’s because we love it. We took all the pizzas we made them all vegan. Cheesesteaks, sausages, peppers and onions, hot dogs, you name it, we have it here and it’s all vegan.”
Rolls are delivered fresh every morning. Boardwalk fries are just like the ones you’d get on the boardwalk. Vegan Commissary in South Philadelphia provides the beefless meat for the roast beef and Conscious Creamery, another South Philly joint, makes the vegan mozzarella on the margherita pizza.
All the proceeds from the pizza steak will be donated monthly to the Philadelphia Vietnam Veterans Memorial in honor of their Ocean City neighbor who lost his legs in the Vietnam War.
T here’s cotton candy, fried Oreos, chickn’ wings, pizza - even an 18inch Boardwalk Jumbo, as well as Italian hoagies, steaks and burgers - all vegan.
Every Sunday, it ’ ll be Italian at Boardwalk Vegan with meatballs made from Beyond Meat and their secret ingredients, all the pastas and cannolis, tiramisu, sticky buns and doughnuts.
Sumey said their intent is to foster happiness for all their visitors - bags of popcorn are handed out to those waiting in line and she’s setting up performers like Doo Wop groups and Sinatra-like singers to entertain.
The couple’s intent is that Boardwalk Vegan becomes patrons’ #yearroundhappyplace.
“W hen I was growing up, both sides of my family my mother’s side and my father’s side, one went to Ocean City, one went to Wildwood, we always rented places on the boardwalk, near the beach,” Sumey said. “On Sundays by 3 o’clock you could smell it. T hey ’d start early in the morning. You smelled the gravy, you smelled the meatballs from the beach and you knew it was time to go home and eat.
“I hope that we can make that community here where people can remember their grandparents or their parents or remember what it felt like when you were on the beach holding hands with your grandpop,” she said, adding that it’s all about bringing joy to others. “Think of things that are happy, that’s all we care about”
Boardwalk Vegan at 28 N. Manoa Road in Havertown is expected to be open 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday and will be closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. Takeout and pick-up serv ice is available. Delivery is not set up yet. The telephone number is 484453-8798 and the website is boardwalkvegan.com.