The Villager Family Restaurant: Finer Diner
by Michelle Troutman

"It's just basic -- we don't do anything fancy, because fancy costs people money," says The Villager Family Restaurant owner/chef Joe Marcoux. His restaurant has a simple layout with rows of tables, chairs, and booths, and a servery off to the side. A glance around the room reveals some surprising touches; colorful paintings line the right wall above the booths, another is a corner where customers can have fruit baskets made to order with some of the many nuts, candies, and chocolates on display in jars.

The paintings were painted by local artist Carol Fowler, who came in and asked Marcoux if she could hang her artwork in the restaurant. Marcoux is open to the idea of providing more space for artists. "I would entertain anybody that wants to put up art."

Fruit baskets are most popular during the Christmas season. Prices range from $22.00 to $50.00 depending on the size, the weight, and the contents. They date back to before the restaurant became a restaurant. Sometime in the early 1900s, Verzoni Brothers, confectioners who sold ice cream, candies, and fruit opened up at 140 Main St., roughly where the entrance to the Concourse is now. By the 1940s, it became the restaurant Diambri's. Circa 1963, Diambri's clerk Emile Cote and his wife Henrietta bought it. Meanwhile, urban renewal, the destruction of old buildings to make way for new ones or for parking spaces, swept along Main Street, taking Diambri's down with it.

By the mid-1960s, the Cotes had changed the name to The Villager Family Restaurant, which had moved into the Forum Shopping Center, part of a mini strip mall now known as the Concourse.

Marcoux hadn't planned to own his own restaurant. Now 51, when he was in high school, he started working as a dishwasher at the Villager under previous owner Nick Ladd, who bought the restaurant after Cote retired. Upon graduation, Marcoux went to college for a year, and then worked for three years at Maine Central Railroad before being laid off, and later worked in construction. Out of the blue, Ladd offered him a job as a short order cook. "He called me one day, and said, 'I could use somebody to be a cook in the kitchen.' I said, 'I don't really know much about it.' He said, 'Well, it's not that hard -- you could probably learn it.'"

Customers in their 50s and 60s who came to the restaurant when they were kids tell Marcoux that it hasn't changed. Liver and onions, roast turkey, beans and franks, salmon pie, and other dishes -- not found at chain restaurants -- stay on the menu; after Marcoux bought the restaurant, he added appetizers, and at customers' request, a Rueben sandwich. Marcoux states that the food is not processed, and that everything is made from scratch.

Half-price pasta day on Thursdays also remains, as does the chance to win a free meal. Every day, the staff picks a name from a jar which contains slips of paper customers wrote their names down on when they received their meal receipts. Winner's names are posted on a bulletin board and they have up to three weeks to come back in and claim the prize.

For those interested in opening their own restaurant, Marcoux advises, "You have to be disciplined and dedicated; people see the ca-ca-ca ching of the register on Thursday, but they don't see the thousand dollar light bill out back; they don't see the payroll that you have to meet, and all the hidden stuff," which includes sales tax and insurance.

A typical day for Marcoux begins at a quarter to seven in the morning, when he starts the muffins and the coffee machine and handles early deliveries. He cooks by opening time, then by 8:30, shifts to doing paperwork, running errands, or dealing with salesmen, and by early afternoon, returns to cooking. Some days he works 13 hours.

"The restaurant business is one of the toughest businesses to be in, because you have to stay on top of things all the time," he says. The prices of produce, meats, and seafood change often bearing a close eye, and the issue of controlling the waste of food is another. "We have little waste here because we don't produce more than we can handle."

Beyond the menu, Marcoux attributes the restaurant's success to the consistency of management over the years, good food at low prices, portions people can handle, and the friendly, long-term wait staff; waitresses Belinda and Joanne have been there since 1976 and the early 1990s. Marcoux's wife Judy serves as hostess, having worked then since before Ladd sold the restaurant, and the next generation has stepped up to the plate, too -- daughter Alicia is a waitress.

One of the longest continually running restaurants in Waterville, the Villager shows no signs of stopping, with a winning formula made of the ingredients for success.

The Villager Family Restaurant at 40 East Concourse is open from 7:30am to 7:00pm Monday through Saturday. Winter hours are 7:30am to 6:30pm: (207) 872-6231.

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