FORAGER RYAN FARR BUILT AN UNLIKELY EMPIRE ON MEAT — AND NOW HE’S OAKLAND-BOUND.
Building a business is rarely a linear process. Sitting inside the Oakland location of what will eventually become his second barbecue joint, Ryan Farr’s description of his company’s growth trajectory sounds about as linear as a Barry Zito curveball — the Oakland A’s vintage, of course. His company, 4505 Meats, has evolved into one of the Bay Area’s most improbable, yet now essential, food businesses.
It started with fried pigskin. Farr, 38, first began making his now-ubiquitous 4505 chicharrones as a way to use the excess pigskin he had access to while working in the kitchen of San Francisco’s Fifth Floor restaurant in the late 2000s. In 2009, he and his then-wife, Cesalee Venema, started making and packaging pork rinds from scratch in his Mission District apartment to sell to local bars. Elixir Saloon, which Farr lived above at the time, became the first place to carry his updated take on the gas station staple. It was hardly the last: 4505’s “crispy clouds of porkalicious-ness” spread like wildfire across the city.
At the time, the new dad and longtime chef — he started washing dishes at 15 and has been in kitchens ever since — was certain of one thing: He didn’t want to re-enter the restaurant industry.
“I actually publicly said that I never wanted to get back into restaurants,” he says. “I started the meat company partly so that I was able to be home at a decent hour to be with my kids.”
Fueled by farmers’ markets, most notably the Ferry Plaza, the business expanded quickly to include a line of bacon-studded hot dogs, a barbecue catering business and a whole-animal butcher shop in the Mission.
Eventually, Farr made room for an exception: The Kansas City native grew up on unpretentious, classic American eateries, exemplified in San Francisco by Brother-in-Law’s Bar-B-Que on Divisadero and Whiz Burgers Drive-In in the Mission. If one of those beloved old-school institutions ever went on the market, he vowed to throw his hat in the ring. That’s exactly what happened in 2013 when Farr took over the Divisadero Street location of Da Pitt, the successor to Brotherin-Law’s, complete with its historic wood-fired barbecue pit. His 4505 Meats Burgers & BBQ has been packing them in ever since.
“And as soon as I got into it, instantly those feelings came back and it was like, ‘This is a no-brainer. I need to get back in the restaurant business,’ ” he says.
It took nearly three years, but Farr has once again rediscovered that feeling, this time in the heart of Oakland’s Laurel District, where he’s taking over another old-school spot.
Located at the corner of MacArthur Boulevard and 35th Avenue, Glenn’s Hot Dogs was about as classic as it gets, serving up traditional breakfasts, broiled burgers and barbecue hot dogs in a petite 1950s-era building — think wood-paneled interior, sit-down counter facing the grill and a rotating lightbulb sign.
“As soon as I saw it I fell in love,” Farr says. “The sign is amazing, the building is amazing. It just has exactly the same type of feel that Brother-in-Law’s did. These are exactly the kinds of places that I like to go.”
The story at Glenn’s was a familiar one for older, familyrun restaurants these days. Husband-and-wife owners David Chew and Bau Jin Huang were getting up in years, their kids didn’t want the business and so they were looking to get out. Farr eagerly stepped in and took over operations in August.
He’s not the first to fall for this tight-knit Oakland neighborhood. The Laurel has been drawing attention recently with new places like the popular Sequoia Diner (which took over longtime breakfast spot Full House Cafe) and one, possibly two, craft beer-related businesses in the works.
With that turnover has come some of the gentrification angst so familiar in San Francisco and, increasingly, the East Bay. It’s something Farr is aware of, and he emphasizes that he wants to preserve the restaurant’s feel as much as possible.
“All we’re doing is adding the barbecue — they’ve been doing hot dogs and burgers here forever,” he says. “Our goal here is the same as Divisadero: To take an existing building and update it a bit. Our approach is that we just want to keep the vibe alive. We want this type of look and feel of this older building to be here as long as possible, as opposed to being developed into something (that is) socalled bigger and better.”
He’s planning to open up the interior and add outdoor seating. But otherwise, he says, he’ll leave the architecture mostly as is. Other than the addition of a full-time hog cooker in the back, the Oakland restaurant will have the same menu (and name) as the Divisadero location. He’s also hoping that, as in San Francisco, the new spot proves to be an all-inclusive draw.
“It’s not just some hip new thing; barbecue to me is about community and bringing together all walks of life,” he says. “You’re all standing in line together, you sit down together and your kids are going to run around together. I grew up
eating barbecue from all over the U.S. And while the styles are different, one thing that was always consistent is that you’re sitting down next to a total stranger and, at some point, hopefully, you’re going to say hello.”
The forthcoming project is also one of the reasons Farr made the difficult decision to divest himself of what has been an important part of his business and identity: whole animal butchery.
In 2015, soon after opening the Divisadero restaurant, he started phasing out his catering business and commissary kitchen, and closed his Mission Street butcher shop. The reason was both logistical — at one point 4505 Meats was juggling seven divisions, from catering to the butcher shop — as well as a philosophical shift. Offering snout-to-tail service was admirable but ultimately too expensive.
“It was definitely worth it, and I’m very proud of everything we did and all the farmers and ranchers we worked with, and still work with, but it was hard to look at charging $35 per pound for rib eye,” he says. “I would totally go and buy that, but I’m a very small segment of the market, and I realized that we were alienating a big percentage of the folks out there. We wanted to have a place where you could come in and get value at a price that won’t blow your budget. That was the goal of the restaurant.”
Farr emphasizes that 4505 still buys humanely raised meat from sustainable ranches, but its point of emphasis has pivoted from butchery over to restaurants. The company also refocused its energy on its founding product. 4505 recently came out with new flavors and packaging for its chicharrones (made from pork skin sourced from a collective of small family farms), which, as of this month, are being distributed nationally.
It’s all part of the ebb and flow and evolution of building a business that has grown from two employees to more than 70.
“In the beginning there was no plan — we never said no to anything. We’d show up at events and just figure it out,” he recalls. “Now, we try to make decisions based on facts while still sticking to the mission and morals that’s made the 4505 team and family the way it is. We only want to walk into things that we feel passionate about.”
The end of this month will see one more evolution — and the end of another big cornerstone in 4505 Meats’ history. The company will withdraw its stall from the Ferry Plaza farmers’ market, where it has been a huge draw for more than seven years. With the new restaurant on the way, the timing seemed right.
“That’s really where we got started, and we owe so much to everyone out there,” he says. “But we’re excited to kind of ‘graduate’ from the market — the whole reason for the farmers’ market is for businesses to start there and grow.”
Will 4505’s growth include more restaurants? Farr insists they have their hands full with the Oakland project, but he admits that he’s always looking out for potential new locations —and one in particular is on his mind.
“We’ve been knocking on Whiz Burgers’ door for five years now, just in case,” Farr says. “We’ll keep knocking. If it was available we’d be first in line with an offer.”
4505 Burgers & BBQ: 705 Divisadero St., San Francisco; and 3506 MacArthur Ave., Oakland. 4505meats.com