AADL Talks To: John Metzger

Sat, 03/23/2024 - 12:46pm

When: June 1, 2023

In this episode, AADL Talks To John Metzger, third-generation owner of Metzger's Restaurant at 305 N Zeeb Rd. John walks us through the history of his family's restaurant, from its origin 90 years ago on Washington Street in Ann Arbor, and discusses what's changed - and what's remained the same - over the years as the business passed from his grandfather to his father to John. He also shares his memories of growing up in the restaurant; his efforts, along with his sister Heidi, to reopen at a new location on the west side of town after closing the downtown location; and he talks about the employees and customers that have kept the business a thriving enterprise for nearly a century.

Read historical articles about Metzger's.

Browse our Metzger Family Collection featuring many of the historical photos that line the walls of Metzger's Restaurant.

Read about Hoelzle's Butcher Shop and Metzger's Restaurant, by local historian Grace Shackman, August 1993

Transcript

• [00:00:03] EMILY MURPHY: Hi. This is Amy, and this is Emily. Today AADL talks to John Metzger. John is a third-generation owner of Ann Arbor's Historic Metzger's Restaurant, founded in 1928 on Washington Street, and now currently located at 305 North Zeeb Road. Hi John, could you tell us about the start of your family's business?
• [00:00:28] JOHN METZGER: My grandfather and grandmother came over in the early 20s, around 1922 from Germany. They came over on a ship and they landed in New York at Ellis Island, and then they ended up in Ann Arbor. Ted Heusel's grandfather. Samuel Heusel sponsored my grandfather over. He was a baker in Ann Arbor and he had a little bakery called The Home Bakery right on the corner of Liberty and Fourth Avenue. My grandfather worked there for a year. Then after that, he worked at the Michigan Union for several years as a pastry chef and baker. He really enjoyed that and one of the person that worked for him was Benny Oosterbaan, who was a Michigan coach much later. He washed pots and pans for my grandfather at the Michigan Union. Then a business came up on the corner of West Washington and Ashley, which was called Flautz Restaurant and the Flautz's moved back to Germany, so they wanted to lease their restaurant. My grandfather and his partner heard about this, and actually Christian Kuhn worked for the Flautz and my grandfather and Christian Kuhn took over that business, took over the lease, and leased it, and changed the name to the Corner German American Restaurant. That's where they actually started, and they were there until 1936.
• [00:02:00] AMY CANTU: It's interesting, you mentioned that the Heusel family sponsored your family, and I know that the Weber's had a connection with you as well. It seems like the German community was a really strong one and a very supportive one, but can you tell us a little bit about that?
• [00:02:19] JOHN METZGER: Herman Weber, he was only like maybe 20 years old in that area and he worked for my grandfather when he opened the restaurant on West Washington. He worked there from like 1934-36, and he lived with my grandparents upstairs above the restaurant. He helped move the restaurant from West Washington to East Washington, they moved the restaurant overnight, so they never missed a day. They closed it like in the evening and then Herman Weber and my grandparents and staff moved everything up the street to East Washington, and Herman worked for my grandparents for several years. Then he started his own restaurant in 1937. He started a little place, I think a little hamburger gas station on Road Platte in Washtenaw in 1937, and that's where Herman Weber started.
• [00:03:17] AMY CANTU: Was there rivalry over the years or?
• [00:03:19] JOHN METZGER: Not with the Weber's. I'm still friends with Kenny Weber, been a friend for a long time. We knew each other. We went to the same church and we had kids at the same time.
• [00:03:32] AMY CANTU: That's great.
• [00:03:33] JOHN METZGER: We know each other that way, and I still keep in touch with him.
• [00:03:38] EMILY MURPHY: Take us through the restaurant's history. You said that moved from West Washington to East Washington?
• [00:03:43] JOHN METZGER: Yes.
• [00:03:43] EMILY MURPHY: Then what was its next step?
• [00:03:46] JOHN METZGER: The next step, the Floutses moved back to Ann Arbor, and then they wanted their restaurant back, so they had to get out of that location. They lost a lease and my grandfather and grandmother didn't know exactly what they were going to do. But a building came available at 203 East Washington, and so they purchased that building for $8,000 and they moved up there. My grandfather, he worked very hard and he had paid that debt off in less than a year, which was unheard of. We moved up the street and things started getting better in 1936-1938 business started to improve a lot. They went through the Depression in the late '20s and '30s.
• [00:04:38] AMY CANTU: And Prohibition?
• [00:04:40] JOHN METZGER: In Prohibition too, yeah. That was a big deal too.
• [00:04:42] AMY CANTU: You got to tell us about the story about your grandfather's cider.
• [00:04:45] JOHN METZGER: That was at the old location on West Washington during Prohibition. My grandfather served cider at the restaurant. It went hard it turned into hard cider [LAUGHTER], which he says he didn't realize that [LAUGHTER].
• [00:05:01] AMY CANTU: You're not sure?
• [00:05:02] JOHN METZGER: I'm not positive. I don't want to say anything, but he got in pretty big trouble for that, for serving hard cider during prohibition. He had to pay $100 fine and $1 a month for five years.
• [00:05:16] AMY CANTU: That's a lot back then.
• [00:05:18] JOHN METZGER: Back in the 20s that was a lot of money. But they made it through.
• [00:05:24] AMY CANTU: When did your father take over the business?
• [00:05:26] JOHN METZGER: He started working there, when he was 10 or 11 years old, as a child. They lived upstairs. My grandparents were down working. They worked breakfast, lunch, and dinner seven days a week. They worked very hard. My father and his brother, they helped at the restaurant washing dishes or bussing tables. That's basically how he started. Then [NOISE] during the war, my dad went to served in the Navy for a couple of years, and then he came back and pretty much worked full time with my grandfather and grandparents and family.
• [00:06:11] AMY CANTU: You became - was it a partner in 75?
• [00:06:14] JOHN METZGER: 1978.
• [00:06:15] AMY CANTU: In 1978 okay.
• [00:06:16] JOHN METZGER: I started working there too when I was in school around 10, 11, 12 years old washing glasses and bussing tables.
• [00:06:24] EMILY MURPHY: What was that like being a kid in a family business?
• [00:06:28] JOHN METZGER: I loved it. I look forward to going there to work. I grew up in the restaurant business. My dad took me to work with him. Sometimes in the morning if my mom had things to do and I'd love going there and helping out. Sometimes I'd peel potatoes. When I was growing up, the restaurant opened, we served dinner only from four until midnight. There's a lot of prep work to do during the day. I've spent a lot of time there, I enjoyed it. It was like a kid, it was something cool to do [LAUGHTER]. Sometimes I brought my friends down and they loved watching what's going on in the restaurant, in the back of the house.
• [00:07:12] AMY CANTU: But did you give them free meals?
• [00:07:14] JOHN METZGER: Yeah. Hamburgers and french fries we'd go back and make.
• [00:07:18] AMY CANTU: That's great.
• [00:07:20] EMILY MURPHY: Did you have a favorite task to be given when you were a child working in the restaurant?
• [00:07:25] JOHN METZGER: I like working behind the bar, washing glasses when I was real young, 12 years old. But then my dad wanted me to learn everything, so I washed dishes, I was a busboy, and then when I got a little older, my dad said, you got to work in the kitchen a little bit as well. I did that for a couple of years to learn that. Then my dad, he wanted to slow down a little bit and travel with my mom. He liked to go to Germany because my mom had a lot of family over there, eight sisters and a couple of brothers. They like traveling a lot. When I graduated from high school, I worked full time and I went to college a couple of years at U of M and my dad needed me at the restaurant, so I took over.
• [00:08:08] AMY CANTU: Was there ever a period of time you thought, maybe I'll do something that isn't the restaurant business?
• [00:08:13] JOHN METZGER: That's what I was thinking of. I played the trumpet and I really wanted to be in the Michigan Marching Band. That's why I wanted to go to U of M, so that's my dream, and I did that for two years. Took a lot of music courses.
• [00:08:27] AMY CANTU: The restaurant called you back?
• [00:08:29] JOHN METZGER: My dad needed me and I love the restaurant business and I love the people. I guess this is for me.
• [00:08:37] EMILY MURPHY: Do you still have your trumpet?
• [00:08:39] JOHN METZGER: Yeah. I still play.
• [00:08:41] EMILY MURPHY: Excellent.
• [00:08:41] AMY CANTU: Great.
• [00:08:41] AMY CANTU: Almost every day playing in the Ann Arbor Concert band and a couple of other groups.
• [00:08:46] AMY CANTU: Neat. I didn't know that.
• [00:08:47] JOHN METZGER: Community bands.
• [00:08:49] AMY CANTU: We're going to work with them as well on this project.
• [00:08:51] JOHN METZGER: Nice. Good.
• [00:08:53] AMY CANTU: Before you go, I want to talk a little bit more about when you took over the restaurant. But before we do that, you just so we've got the whole Metzger family history down here. Your grandfather's brother Fritz, he opened up a restaurant too. Can you talk a little bit about that?
• [00:09:10] JOHN METZGER: His brother, Fritz and another brother, Gottfried. The three of them came over at the same time, the three brothers and my grandfather was a baker. They're all bakers actually.
• [00:09:22] JOHN METZGER: He owned the old German, Fritz Metzger, but he started in Ypsilanti actually, and had a restaurant there. Then he had some problems with business in Ypsilanti, and then he moved to Ann Arbor and opened a restaurant on Huron Street for a while. Then in 1946, he bought The Old German from Gottlieb Schumacher, who owned Old German at that time. That's where the Old German and Metzger's.
• [00:09:49] AMY CANTU: Was Fritz's Restaurant called The Old German?
• [00:09:51] JOHN METZGER: Well, not originally. He bought the Old German in 1946, which was already the Old German. He had another couple of restaurants and one in Ipsy. Then he moved to Ann Arbor on here on street.
• [00:10:03] AMY CANTU: Got you. Wow.
• [00:10:04] JOHN METZGER: It had a different name called something like, German Cafe or something.
• [00:10:09] AMY CANTU: Wow. That's a lot of history. Restaurants there.
• [00:10:12] JOHN METZGER: Then Gottfried Metzger, he had the bakery which was right across the street from Metzger's kitty corner on the corner of Fourth and East Washington kitty corner from the old Metzger. We bought all our baked goods from the bread and pastries and cakes.
• [00:10:28] AMY CANTU: That's so great.
• [00:10:29] JOHN METZGER: He retired in 1972. He was there from the '40s until the '70s. It's called the Deluxe Bakery.
• [00:10:37] AMY CANTU: I think we have some photos of that too.
• [00:10:40] JOHN METZGER: He was a great guy.
• [00:10:42] EMILY MURPHY: Speaking of names, what names did the Metzger's Family Restaurant have over the years?
• [00:10:50] JOHN METZGER: It started as the Corner German American restaurant that what they called it right after the flouts has moved out. Then my grandfather and his partner, when they moved up the street, they changed the name to Metzger's German Restaurant. During the War, dropped the German for a while because there was a lot of problems during that time. A lot of rumors going around about our family, which was really tough on my family, my grandparents and my father. It's tough times.
• [00:11:21] AMY CANTU: Can you talk about that a little bit? What they did? I know there was an open letter. Can you talk about about that?
• [00:11:28] JOHN METZGER: Rumors were going around and, around town at the barber shops, how they talk. There were rumors were going around that my grandfather had a secret line to Berlin above the restaurant. A bunch of a lot of German gentlemen would come in every day after work and come and hang out at a big round table and talk and drink a beer before they went home. Some people just started talking. They said, well, they didn't know exactly what was going on there, and so they just started making rumors that went around town. It got pretty bad. Business fell off a lot during that time, in the early '40s. Then my grandfather wrote a letter to the Ann Arbor News, an open letter, saying, I'm an American citizen, my family, my sons go to school here. My wife and myself are American citizens. We went through that and after that letter was published in the Ann Arbor News, which a friend of his was a reporter up there, the rumors began to stop and a lot of letters started coming into my grandparents and apologizing for spreading some of the rumors, which was really nice.
• [00:12:36] EMILY MURPHY: Wow, that is amazing.
• [00:12:37] JOHN METZGER: After that business started to come back again.
• [00:12:40] AMY CANTU: Oh my gosh. He needed to write that letter. That was good. He shamed the community for doing that.
• [00:12:47] JOHN METZGER: It was a very tough time for them. Yeah.
• [00:12:49] AMY CANTU: Did it ever linger? Are there vestiges of that or did it die down completely?
• [00:12:54] JOHN METZGER: It pretty much died down pretty quickly after that. My grandfather was honest and people people believed him. He was a very honest businessman and very nice.
• [00:13:03] AMY CANTU: I'm sorry.
• [00:13:04] JOHN METZGER: The community did a lot of things for the community. When 1936, I think the Bell Tower was being built at U of M, and he donated quite a bit of money for that. His name is on a plaque, all the people that helped build the bell tower. That's a cool piece of history.
• [00:13:23] AMY CANTU: I didn't know that. That's great. Can you talk a little bit about the years when you were there and in charge? Take us through the period from that to the restaurant on Zeeb Road.
• [00:13:38] JOHN METZGER: In 1984, actually, Harry's Army Surplus was still at their location right on the corner. We purchased a building in 1984. Harry's Army Surplus was there for, I think until 1989 when they moved out, they moved out and went up to campus. That's when we decided to expand, and we added a nice bar next door, and we expanded right on the corner. It was nice exposure and it was time to remodel. We needed to update the kitchen and we get a lot of big groups to come in. We had a little party room in the back, which was really nice. We completely remodeled the whole restaurant, which was a big deal. It was a lot to do. It stressed out my dad a little bit. [LAUGHTER]
• [00:14:24] AMY CANTU: That's a beautiful historic building there too.
• [00:14:28] JOHN METZGER: The historical society had to approve everything we did. We got an award for remodeling in the old way without disturbing the historical character of the building.
• [00:14:44] AMY CANTU: How was that negotiating all of those?
• [00:14:46] JOHN METZGER: It was a rough time. [LAUGHTER] But it worked out well. It went well until our parking structure across the street closed, which was a big deal for us because we needed that parking. Especially, we have a lot of older customers and that's where people parked. It got really hard when they closed that and then they tore it down and they didn't really realize if they're going to open it up again. It took almost three years till it opened, which was a very rough time again for us. Business fell down. We had to do something and a big corporation came to us and wanted to buy our building and the business name was Wallaby's. I'm not even sure if they're still around Wallaby's. There was a chain restaurant and they purchased our building and business. But I didn't really want to close up for good. I wouldn't know what to do. I was still a little young, 40-something. We closed the restaurant in 1999 and then I pursued reopening somewhere but I didn't know exactly where. It took a little bit longer than I wanted. It took almost two years to reopen and found a location out on Zeeb Road.
• [00:16:03] EMILY MURPHY: But your customer base stuck with you. You've got very long-running customer.
• [00:16:07] JOHN METZGER: Were a little worried about, moving from downtown because we've been there so long, 70-something years. The move was very stressful and we didn't know if our customers were going to follow or come back was two years being closed. When we did reopen, which took two years and a lot of stress, and my sister Heidi helped out a lot. She took a late leave of absence for a couple years from her job to help me reopen this place. I also had a partner to help me, Joe Neely, he was a local guy. He's been living in Ann Arbor his whole life and he was a good friend of mine all the way back from high school. He helped open up towards myself, Joe Neely and my sister Heidi, that got the restaurant open again on Zeeb Road.
• [00:16:54] EMILY MURPHY: That's great.
• [00:16:55] JOHN METZGER: We opened up and we were worried. A lot of our employees came back, which is really nice.
• [00:17:00] AMY CANTU: Wow.
• [00:17:01] JOHN METZGER: I had a lot of loyal employees from way back. They supported me and I called him all back and I was a little worried, so we had a good core staff, which is really nice. When we opened up in I think June 6th, 2001, and we had lines out the door for several weeks.
• [00:17:23] AMY CANTU: I remember that well.
• [00:17:25] JOHN METZGER: Moving, I was so happy. It's kept going on. We've been busy almost ever since.
• [00:17:32] AMY CANTU: You haven't had any parking problems?
• [00:17:33] JOHN METZGER: No parking problems. [LAUGHTER] Our bridge closed for nine months.
• [00:17:37] AMY CANTU: That's right.
• [00:17:38] JOHN METZGER: That was a little rough, but we got through that. [LAUGHTER] We had construction specials and people still came.
• [00:17:45] EMILY MURPHY: Can you talk about your regular customers, folks you see year after year?
• [00:17:50] JOHN METZGER: That's what's really nice about the business. But I love the people that come in and we have a lot of regular customers and there's so many. We have people that come every day. We have a customer at the bar that comes every single day, sometimes twice a day.
• [00:18:03] EMILY MURPHY: What a compliment. [LAUGHTER].
• [00:18:04] JOHN METZGER: I know. We have, a lot of older customers that come regularly every week or sometimes twice a week.
• [00:18:11] AMY CANTU: It feels very homey in there. You have cuckoo clocks galore and Stein's. Can you talk a little bit about the decor and who collects all of that?
• [00:18:20] JOHN METZGER: Over the years, my grandparents, they went to Germany a few times. My parents went every other year. Every time they went they brought something back. Beer Stein or a cuckoo clock or some cool things they found there some plaques, and so that was really nice. When we closed downtown, we had an auction and sold a lot of things. When we reopened, a lot of the stuff started coming back. People that bought the stuff, they said, since you're reopening, we're going to bring this back to you.
• [00:18:48] AMY CANTU: That was amazing.
• [00:18:48] JOHN METZGER: It was very moving too. I couldn't believe it. All the Beers Steins came back and some big plaques and a lot of cool things. It took a while until the restaurant looked homey again. Our downtown location was really old. It had a lot of character. When we first opened, it was a little bit bare, but now we have so many Beers Steins. We don't even have room for everything anymore. It was nice.
• [00:19:16] AMY CANTU: This is going to sound strange, but I think we would love to hear. Could you just run through a typical day in your job? What does it look like from when you get up to when you close?
• [00:19:29] JOHN METZGER: Well, I get there right now. My hours have been changed a little bit since my sister has been helping a lot more. She retired and she's helping a little bit more so I can take a little more time off. I go in there every day, every morning, seven days a week at 8.00 or 8.30. I make sure everything's running smoothly. I do some of the beer and wine and liquor orders, which I love doing, and get things ready to open up and if things are running smoothly sometimes I'll leave and then I'll work a shift. Friday I'll work a double shift from 8.00 in the morning until 7.00 or 8.00 at night sometimes. Saturdays and Sundays I work a little bit more. But I deal with a lot of employee issues, which sometimes gets hard.
• [00:20:18] AMY CANTU: As any manager would.
• [00:20:20] JOHN METZGER: I like the people. A lot of people that come in and they like to see the owners there. They like to see Heidi and myself there. We try and be there as much as we can, and it's nice to have Heidi back. When my brothers and sisters, they all worked there. Susan worked there when she was in college and Heidi and Fred, and we all worked there in high school and college, which is really nice. Family business. My parents, after they retired, they came in almost every day, especially when they got a little older because it was harder for them to cook all the time, but they came in almost every day.
• [00:20:57] EMILY MURPHY: What was that like for you? Did you feel watched or were you glad to start?
• [00:21:00] JOHN METZGER: I felt watched sometimes. [LAUGHTER]
• [00:21:03] JOHN METZGER: My dad he had his opinions.
• [00:21:07] AMY CANTU: It's my business now, dad.
• [00:21:08] JOHN METZGER: Made him nervous sometimes to sit there and watch what's going on because he'd always sit there at the bar and have his dinner and he'd say, did you take care of those people? Always said make sure somebody gets over there and he noticed everything.
• [00:21:22] AMY CANTU: It was in his blood.
• [00:21:22] JOHN METZGER: It was when we worked together which was a little difficult sometimes working with your family all the time, especially, when I lived at home and worked with everybody, and my brothers and sisters were always there. My mom and dad were all working together and sometimes it was a little trying sometimes, but when I was turned 18, I lived above the restaurant as well for a couple of years.
• [00:21:51] AMY CANTU: Wow.
• [00:21:51] JOHN METZGER: That was nice.
• [00:21:51] AMY CANTU: You're committed?
• [00:21:52] JOHN METZGER: Yeah.
• [00:21:53] AMY CANTU: You're really committed.
• [00:21:55] JOHN METZGER: I loved the business.
• [00:21:57] AMY CANTU: What about your chef? Can you tell us a little bit about.
• [00:22:00] JOHN METZGER: Right now our chef is Ryan Dunkelberger, who's the fourth generation. Hopefully, he'll stick around and I think he wants to take over the business when I choose to retire and my kids are doing other things. My son works in Washington DC, and my daughter is in the medical field. She works at St. Joe. They all worked at the restaurant as well but they're doing other things right now so Ryan, my sister's son he loves working in the kitchen. He's worked out front a little bit, but he likes it in the back a little bit better. He's really a good, great chef. He does a lot of great things with fish and chicken and plus all our German things which the recipes came back from Germany years and years ago, which he's kept the same, which is important.
• [00:22:46] EMILY MURPHY: Let's talk about the food. Do you have a favorite?
• [00:22:49] JOHN METZGER: My favorite is a sauerbraten, which is one of our house specialties from way back. It's a family recipe. It's a marinated beef with a sour cream sauce and it's really good with spaetzle, which is a homemade noodle and red cabbage or potato pancakes. Those are my favorites.
• [00:23:08] AMY CANTU: That's what I get every time.
• [00:23:10] JOHN METZGER: We have a lot of other specials like rouladen and other specialties you can't get anywhere. It's a rolled beef and it's stuffed with bacon, pickle onions, and it's in a tomato beef sauce, which is cooked several hours, so it's really tender. We have a lot of different fish specials, salmon and fresh white fish, and lake perch is one of our favorite fishes for all of our customers. [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:23:37] EMILY MURPHY: What I get it.
• [00:23:38] JOHN METZGER: Comes in fresh several times a week. All our fish does so it's not all German. We have prime rib and we have steaks and chops so it's not all German food. Which some people think it's all German but there's a lot of variety.
• [00:23:55] EMILY MURPHY: Correct me. You said that your chef is a fourth generation. It's your sister's son?
• [00:24:01] JOHN METZGER: Yeah. Not Heidi, but Susan, my other sister.
• [00:24:04] EMILY MURPHY: That's remarkable that you've managed to keep the business in the family for this long and already can see what the next steps are.
• [00:24:11] AMY CANTU: That is.
• [00:24:13] JOHN METZGER: It'd be nice to have him take over. I'd like to keep it going. We're trying to. I want to be there until the hundredth anniversary, which is a five more years.
• [00:24:22] EMILY MURPHY: It's coming right up. Coming up the plans already.
• [00:24:24] JOHN METZGER: It goes fast?
• [00:24:25] AMY CANTU: What are your plans?
• [00:24:26] JOHN METZGER: For the hundredth anniversary, I want to have another October Fest that year. We used to have October Fest every year from like '02 until '14 or 2014, but it just got too big and the hotel that's behind the restaurant moved in several years ago and that's where we parked all the cars because we had hundreds and hundreds of cars and it just got too big for us to handle. But on 100th anniversary we're gonna figure something out, have a big party somewhere.
• [00:25:01] EMILY MURPHY: You'll have a lot of people who want to celebrate.
• [00:25:03] JOHN METZGER: Yeah, we'll probably have a band and we'll probably do something special. We tried to every five years, so this is our 95th. Ever since, I think it was about the 60th anniversary we did on that day, 60% off and then 65% and then 70, and now we're at 95%.
• [00:25:25] AMY CANTU: Hundred percent off would be really fun. [LAUGHTER]
• [00:25:28] JOHN METZGER: They still pay for their drinks.
• [00:25:30] EMILY MURPHY: There you go.
• [00:25:31] JOHN METZGER: Customers are really nice one that. We don't really advertise that, we just do it and then people show up, but the word gets around.
• [00:25:39] AMY CANTU: That's great.
• [00:25:40] JOHN METZGER: I'm not going to tell you what day it's going to be this year, but it's in December. That's when our actual anniversary is, December 8, 1928.
• [00:25:48] AMY CANTU: That's funny because that's my mother's birthday and we always go to Metzger's on my mother's birthday.
• [00:25:53] JOHN METZGER: Nice.
• [00:25:55] AMY CANTU: We'll try right around there.
• [00:25:57] JOHN METZGER: Good. Well, that's probably when we're going to have the shindig.
• [00:26:03] AMY CANTU: What are you most proud of?
• [00:26:06] JOHN METZGER: I'm most proud of my family [LAUGHTER] that supported me all these years, and my grandparents that kept the place going, and my father that kept it going. My grandfather retired in 1959. My dad wasn't sure he wanted to go into business, and my grandfather said, just do it for a year or two. Just just do that. But he did it for another 30 years and we're still here today and so and my family has helped out. My kids and my grandkids, they're there now too. They're not really working. They come in and help me in the morning. They're 7:00 and 8:00 and 9:00. They like coming in and it's a blessing to have them. Maybe someday they'll work there too. It won't be that much longer really. When they can work.
• [00:26:54] EMILY MURPHY: They'll start washing glasses, right?
• [00:26:55] JOHN METZGER: Yeah. Our customers. It is such a blessing to have such great customers that have been loyal to the restaurant for so long and other we wouldn't be here without our loyal customers. It's unbelievable.
• [00:27:10] AMY CANTU: You're lucky. Congratulations.
• [00:27:12] JOHN METZGER: Thank you. [MUSIC]
• [00:28:11] AMY CANTU: AADL Talks To is a production of the Ann Arbor District Library.