Building a barbecue joint during a pandemic
No one will ever accuse Jamie and Karen Fain of taking shortcuts. The husband-and-wife team’s Fainmous BBQ is one of Houston barbecue’s most unlikely success stories. In their nine years in business, the couple has weathered all manner of adversity, from multiple floods in their Westbury neighborhood, to a health scare and now a global pandemic.
If there is one take-away from the Fains’ story, it’s that persistence and perseverance pay off, and a dedication to their loyal customers is their not-so-secret to success.
The story began in 2011, when Jamie and Karen — who both hail from Knoxville, Tenn. — decided to open an East Tennessee-style barbecue joint in Houston. That in itself presented a challenge. This was during the early days of the craft-barbecue movement and the rise of Central Texas-style barbecue in Houston.
But they were passionate about the barbecue from their home state, which featured pulled pork shoulder served in a vinegar sauce, as well as other pork dishes including spareribs. They set up shop in a strip center on South Post Oak in Westbury. Jamie installed a wood-burning Southern Pride rotisserie smoker and took on the pitmaster duties. Over the next few years, they gained a following for Jamie’s superbly cooked pork shoulder dishes. Then came the challenges. Though their restaurant did not flood, the Memorial Day and Tax Day floods as well as Hurricane Harvey had significant effects on Westbury, as well as nearby Meyerland.
Then in 2017, Karen got a dignosis of breast cancer. After a year of treatment, she recovered and has been in remission since.
More good news came in
2019. A customer suggested they look at moving the restaurant to the booming Sawyer Yards development in central Houston. Representatives from the developers came to their restaurant and, after trying their barbecue, invited them to take a space in one of the newer buildings there. In November 2019, they began building out the location at 1201 Oliver, between Urban South Brewery and City Orchard Cidery.
In January, they closed the Westbury location and moved the smoker to the new space. At that point, it was a race to get the location open so as to minimize the downtime when they temporarily had no income.
By March, the space was “95 percent complete,” according to Karen, when they heard that RodeoHouston had been canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic. Not long after, the stay-at-home order came down, and almost all work stopped on the restaurant. It was a new setback that they never saw coming.
The Fains applied for an Economic Injury Disaster Loan to cover the work stoppage that extended their time without income. But last week, they received an email from the
Small Business Administration that their application was lost and they would need to reapply.
Such a cascade of adversity would stop most restaurateurs in their tracks, but when I spoke with Karen last week, she was her usual positive self. She reported that work had resumed on the new space, and they hope to open in the next month, probably for takeout only, like most restaurants are doing during the dine-in ban.
For now, Jamie and Karen are working to finalize inspections, taking catering orders and doing the occasional popup around Houston. The Fains may be from Tennessee, but they have fully embraced the entrepreneurial spirit of their adopted city. Persisting in the face of adversity, hustling to keep their heads above water and all the while taking care of their customers and community — that’s what Houston barbecue is all about.