Sharkeez Newport Beach - Sometimes you just don’t want to pay $12 for a drink. On those nights, head out to Sharkeez Newport Beach, located at 114 Mcfadden Place. And while they may be cheaper, they’re definitely not weaker.
Sharkeez is the creation of Ron Newman- founder of the red onion chain of casual restaurants that flourished in the 1970’s and ‘80s- and his son Greg. After Greg graduated from USC, Ron offered him $100,000 to start his own place. Soon thereafter, the Newman’s decided to start a new enterprise as a team. They believed that their partnership would be a good fit combining the senior’s experience and expertise with the junior’s young, fresh ideas and understanding of the younger demographic and connections within the college and beach communities.
They traveled around together to Arizona, Texas and Mexico to research other restaurant and nightclub concepts and settled on a casual but cool concept. This theme brought together mesquite broiled Baja style Mexican food with premier sports viewing facilities and a lively late night social gathering place. They called their new restaurant Sharkeez.
It was an instant hit with the young professionals and college students who began frequenting the South Bay beach city at that time. Despite the recession of the early 1990s and the numerous closures of beach bars and restaurants in the South Bay, Greg and Ron Newman decided to stay in the restaurant/nightclub business. During this time, the job market for graduating college students was poor and Greg was approached by many of his fraternity brothers and peers from USC for jobs. It was a symbiotic relationship. His friends were given jobs but he benefited by having highly skilled, well-educated employees during his start-up period in addition to his new staff bringing all their friends and creating a larger crowd.
Sharkeez started off with minimal supplies and staffing, Ron and Greg ran the place for a year before they even hired a manager. Eventually, they decided to add more televisions and upgrade the place a bit in order to tap into a variety of live sporting events and to attract more customers. They found that a lot of people didn’t like going to big sports bars and instead they preferred a cozy place like Sharkeez.
With the success of their first venture, four other successes followed, all in keeping with their beach cantina and restaurant concept: Newport Beach, Hermosa Beach, Santa Barbara and Huntington Beach. The Newman growth by expansion plan is a clear vision which all of his partners and associates understand. It is the Newman’s operating plan to open one store a year moving forward after getting Hermosa Beach back online opening Thursday, July 24th at 5pm.
