Ryan’s Restaurant is a restaurant in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in the United States. More than 300 restaurants are owned and operated by Ryan’s Restaurant Group, Inc., a company based in the southern and midwestern United States. Restaurants are operated by the corporation in 23 states.
When it comes to restaurant names, Ryan’s Grill, Buffet & Bakery is the one that most people are familiar with. The restaurants, which are largely geared toward families, offer a daily-changing menu that includes a variety of steaks, poultry, fish, hamburgers, side dishes, and veggies. The Mega Bar buffet, which is a collection of self-service buffets dispersed across the dining area, is the restaurant’s most well-known signature offering.
Aside from Fire Mountain, Ryan’s also owns over two dozen restaurants that operate under the Fire Mountain brand. A display grill allows customers to view their meals being produced at the Fire Mountain units, which are designed to resemble like a lodge and are more elegant than the Ryan’s Grill, Buffet & Bakery business. Guests at Fire Mountain condos, like those at the bigger company, have unlimited access to the food bars that are strategically placed throughout the dining room.
Alvin A. McCall Jr., the company’s founder, studied business and accounting at universities in Greenville, South Carolina, and Johnson City, Tennessee, before starting his own business. He established McCall Construction Co., which, according to McCall, made a profit of $43,000 in its first year of operation, 1958. This led to a career in real estate development, and he eventually founded and operated a Volkswagen dealership in Sumter, South Carolina.
Restaurants were one of the enterprises that McCall discovered while looking for fascinating businesses to manage. Following the success of the Ponderosa restaurant chain, he established his own Western Family Steak House in 1970, with the majority of its locations becoming known as Quincy’s Steak House in 1976.
Greenville’s Wade Hampton Boulevard was the site of the first restaurant, which was constructed by employees of his contracting company. After the company’s newly hired manager lost $50,000 in three months, McCall took over and established a formula based on the quality concepts he had acquired while working as a contractor. His steakhouse’s commitment to quality began with the usage of fresh meat rather than frozen.
In 1977, McCall sold his interest in Quincy’s to what would become Trans World Corporation, but he retained the freedom to compete. Ryan’s was founded the same year, and the first restaurant, located on Laurens Road in Greenville, opened its doors in 1978.