You may not know them by name, but Chip and Joanna Gaines are a lifestyle brand thanks to a show on HGTV, a line of furniture, even a sprawling warehouse of a store in Texas. Now, they’re getting into the restaurant business.
The duo, who host the hit remodeling show Fixer Upper, purchased the historic Elite Café in Waco, Texas in May. Now, it appears they are fixing it up, with plans to turn it into a breakfast cafe.
According to Southern Living, The Elite Café, which first opened in 1919, counted Elvis Presley among its legions of fans. Its new incarnation likely won’t be hurting for business, considering the Gaines’s massive fan base.
Chip tells Southern Living that the Elite will be reborn as a breakfast-focused spot: “I’ve always been a breakfast connoisseur. I always do a heavy, bigger breakfast, but Jo is the exact opposite. She was kind enough to come with me on this one, and we are going to do up a breakfast joint here in town.”
The café is expected to open in 2017 and, in true Gaines fashion, is a massive undertaking. There are, apparently “a few benefits to a little bit of elbow grease and hard work on the front end,” Chip tells Southern Living.
The Fixer Upper stars’ Magnolia Market, a two-and-a-half acre lifestyle store, has become a landmark of sorts in Waco, Texas. As Curbed reported recently, the couple is insanely likable, and has fans of all ages. Fixer Upper is the number one cable show in its time slot among viewers aged 25 to 54. That popularity is largely thanks to Joanna, an outspoken Christian who has renovated not just hundreds of homes, but the notion of a traditional, stay-at-home wife and mother.
The couple’s brand also includes a bakery called Silos Baking Co., which opened earlier this year. According to its website, Joanna has long harbored dreams of getting into the food business, and grew up baking cookies, pies, and Syrian donuts. So far, there’s no word on whether those treats will land on the menu of the reborn Elite Café.
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