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by Susan Dugan
Born and raised in Fargo, North Dakota,
Mike Miller – founder of the HandleBar &
Grill and current owner of Basil Doc’s Pizzerias – grew up riding his
bike back when nobody rode.
RESTAURATEUR, CYCLING FANATIC AND YOGA TEACHER MIKE MILLER sees adherence to core values as the key to his success as an entrepreneur, and his enjoyment of life through its challenges and successes. What keeps the busy businessman going? “Your passion, your focus and staying true to your inner desires. That’s what brings you back around.” Photo: Paul Kashmann
The self-described “cycling fanatic” later chose to
attend the University of Denver for its hotel/restaurant management program but
also because of a sport nearly as close to his heart as cycling: hockey. He
graduated in 1978 and worked a variety of corporate restaurant venues before
heading to Alaska to work in the restaurant industry in 1982.
Miller returned to the lower 48 in 1989 and
went back to DU to earn an executive MBA. “You have to remember, that in 1989
if you wanted to get an MBA all you really needed was a pulse,” he quips. Upon
graduating in 1991 he took up various local and regional restaurant industry
positions before developing, creating, and launching the former HandleBar & Grill at Alameda and Downing in late
1996/early 1997. The restaurant closed in 2006.
The HandleBar
oozed Miller’s passion for cycling and quickly became a fixture for all things
cycling-related in Denver. “It really was a clubhouse for the cycling
community. It catered to people who were very competitive, hard-core racers,
but also to people who wanted to get on their bikes, clad in spandex or not,
and just be in a welcoming environment where you could talk cycling – and
if you had a question –we could answer it. And you couldn’t have asked
for a better location, considering the cycling community in Washington Park.”
The restaurant not only sponsored races and
events but offered a website: handlebargrill.com,
brimming with information of interest to avid cyclers. “This was just when,
what was then referred to as the World Wide Web was getting developed. My
desire was to be a portal for everything cycling-related in Colorado, if not
the Rocky Mountain region. You could find out everything you needed to know,
about this race and that race.”
Miller credits sticking to his core concept
for the restaurant’s success, a concept based on a sport he knew inside and
out. “We were not posers,” he says. “It would have fallen on its face
otherwise. If I had created a golf concept restaurant when I don’t play golf or
care about golf, I couldn’t have pulled it off. But I knew cycling and was
already connected in the cycling world, and had the good fortune of knowing a
lot of the competitive cyclists back in the day. And we participated in things
like the MS 150 and the Courage Classic that benefits Children’s Hospital.”
In 1999, on a friend’s recommendation,
Miller sampled Basil Doc’s pizza on E. Virginia Ave. in Washington Park, and
was smitten. “I fell in love with it, and understood what they were doing. And
I was at the right place at the right time.” Former owners David and Hillary
Allen were looking to sell the business and return to Connecticut. Miller
bought Basil Doc’s and opened another shop at 3rd and Holly the following year.
In 2004/2005, he opened Basil Doc’s at Florida and Holly, followed by a shop at
32nd and Perry in the Highlands neighborhood.
Miller’s creativity, sound business sense
and flexibility enabled him to expand his business and protect and maintain it
during the rocky economic times of the past few years. “At one time I had five
Basil Doc’s, now I have four. I had two licensed properties, now I have one. So
it’s not that we haven’t been through the economic roller coaster. But we’ve
stayed true to our core concept, which is primarily pickup and takeout, no
delivery. I tell people, ‘You can’t deliver perfect.’ If you want Saks Fifth
Avenue, you’re going to have to go there. That’s not being pompous; it’s just
understanding who we are, what we are, and staying
true to what we do. We don’t do chicken wings, or pasta, or any other collateral
foods. We use deck ovens, very old, that cook pizza incredibly well. In my
humble opinion, the reason people have not weathered the economic storm is they
did not stay true to their core
values. Period.”
An unwavering commitment to sticking to the
basics has kept customers coming back for more. “People ask me, ‘What makes
your pizza so special?’ And I turn it around to, it’s
what we don’t do to the pizza that makes it so special. We don’t add
preservatives, additives, binders, extenders, sugar.
We are very natural, not to be confused with organic because remember, there
are no standards for organic foods. We simply provide what I consider to be the
best pizza you’ve ever eaten.”
Basil Doc’s has also avoided passing
gimmicks and expanding beyond its means. “And our four locations are not in
high-rent districts,” Miller adds. “They are neighborhood locations. Our
typical footprint is somewhere in the neighborhood of 700 square feet. I don’t
lie awake at night wondering how I’m going to make rent this month.”
And at three of four
locations, the restaurant shares space with other entrepreneurs to better
utilize resources. “At the 3rd and Holly and Highland locations, we share space
with Rise & Shine Biscuit Kitchen and Café (riseandshinedenver.com),
created by fellow cyclist Seth Rubin. The location had been built to be a
quick-service restaurant and we were underutilizing, so I invited him to look
at it and six weeks later he was up and running. A year ago he expanded to our
Highlands location.”
In the Wash Park East space, Miller has a
similar arrangement with Raj Dagstani (dagstaniandsons.com), who makes natural jams,
jellies, and marmalades. “People say, ‘You’re brilliant to come up with the
idea of sharing space.’ But I’m not brilliant. I just understand entrepreneurs;
I understand how hard it is; I understand capital investment; and more
importantly, I understand providing an opportunity for like-minded people. It
works for us, it works for the customer, it works for
everybody.”
In what passes for spare time, Miller, a
longtime yoga practitioner, recently became certified as a yoga instructor at
the suggestion of a longtime friend. “I thought, great, now I have to find a
school and manufacture some more hours in the week because when you work for yourself,
you pretty much fill up those hours. But I said, ‘OK, I can do this.’”
He found a school with a philosophy that fit
and completed the labor-intensive training. “And trust me: a guy at 56 is not
the normal yoga student. A 22-year-old woman is your normal yoga student. So it
was an interesting journey.”
Miller now teaches a beginning class three
times a week at the Denver Athletic Club and one night a week at Harmony Yoga
at Leetsdale and Holly. “It’s fun and I like the way
yoga benefits your life. It’s a way to give back a little and expose people to
yoga in a non-threatening, non-traditional, non-matching yoga-top-and-bottom
way. I’m not going after young professionals; I’m going after the north of 50
or 60 professional that understands they probably need to do a little bit of
yoga. The benefits are very personal. And I’m keeping it all in focus. No way
am I giving up Basil Doc’s or joining an ashram. I haven’t had to have my knees
or hips replaced and I’m doing everything I can to not have to make that
decision.”
And he remains a force in the cycling
community. “It is growing, not diminishing. A lot of people know I used to have
a fairly large cycling community out of the HandleBar
& Grill, and now with Seth Rubin of Rise & Shine we have created a
cycling team. So it’s come full circle. What brings you back around? Your
passion, your focus, and staying true to your inner desires.” |
