“We’ve got a good team, and we’ve got a template to do it.” “We know where we fit and what is a good fit for us,” Miller said. The future holds more growth for the restaurant as owners consider adding smaller venues with live music, he said. However, the eatery adapted to changing times by adding salads, a light plate with fewer meats and more menu choices, he said.Īfter weathering the highs and lows of the industry, The County Line has eight establishments in two states-Texas and New Mexico. Prior to 1995, The County Line sides included only coleslaw, potato salad and beans. None of the restaurants closed, but the officers decided to stop growing the business, pay off debt and vowed to become stronger again, he said. In the 1980s, The County Line owners fell on hard times when they had leveraged out the business and banks were calling in their loans, he said. “It was really a gem because it was on the water,” said Miller of the lake location. The RR 2222 site was across the lake from Camp Tom Wooten that Walcutt attended as a boy scout. The County Line on the Lake opened in 1980 as the business’ third location. In 1977 the owners expanded the business to El Paso, naming the new eatery The State Line for its borders on Texas, Mexico and New Mexico. “ went from about 10 dinners a night to 700 dinners a night,” he said. The turning point for the business came after a favorable review by Texas Monthly magazine during its first year of operations, Miller said. The coleslaw was hand-chopped, and beer was poured from a gas pump, he said. Walcutt exchanged Coke bottles for a deposit fee to have enough money for the restaurant, Miller said. On June 14, 1975, they opened TheCounty Line with $37,000 of personal funds and a bank loan for the remainder of the $63,000 investment, he said. When the group met to discuss bringing an upscale barbecue dining experience to the area, Walcutt mentioned the lodge as its site, he said. “It was a little speakeasy where his mother, a schoolteacher, told him and his brother John, ‘Whatever you do, there’s things that go on up there, and you can’t go up there.’”Īs soon as his parents left, the brothers went over to the forbidden building, Miller said. “ used to live across the street from the ,” he said. The County Line’s first 17-acre site originally served as a stagecoach stop, Miller said. Miller, along with Randy and Rick Goss, Ed Norton and Bruce Walcutt, began the barbecue business in 1975 when the partners purchased the Cedar Crest Lodge at 6500 Bee Caves Road, Austin.īoth Goss brothers and Walcutt are deceased, but Norton runs the business with Miller from Austin. Co-owner Don Miller (fifth from left) joins the longtime management staff at the Westlake venue.Īlthough Austin area’s two The County Line barbecue restaurants serve 1 million ribs annually, the eatery started out with humble beginnings, said Don “Skeeter” Miller, co-founder and president of the restaurant’s managing group.
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