Two local restaurant-supply businesses stay busy serving retail and commercial needs

People who love to cook may not be aware of the bounty of kitchen supplies that await them at two stores in the Evergreen area.

Except for the “Public Welcome” sign at the site of Advanced Restaurant Supply, neither that business nor Tri-State Restaurant Supply actively market to retail customers. But both are more than happy to see home cooks come in the doors.

Advanced Restaurant Supply is the older of the two with 20 years in business. Located on Montana 35 east of Kalispell, the store is loaded with pots, pans, knives, dishes, small kitchen tools and other cooking paraphernalia and gadgets — just about anything anyone would need to set up a home or restaurant kitchen, most in quality grades ranging from the less expensive to that sought by a gourmet chef.

“I wish our showroom was twice as large,” store manage Steve Wilson said. “We have crammed this space wall to wall. We have pretty much as much as we can get in here, and we keep trying to add more.”

Advanced Restaurant Supply also carries a warehouse full of commercial kitchen appliances — refrigerators, ranges and countertop equipment, as well as all plumbing fixtures for restaurant kitchens.

The summer months are insanely busy at Advanced Restaurant Supply, Wilson said. As the manager at Applebee’s in Kalispell for 15 years, Wilson knows the seasonal nature of the restaurant business, and he’s finding the same thing holds true for those who supply the food business.

“The restaurant people wait until the last minute,” he said. “They always want it yesterday.”

The store’s refrigeration repair service is extremely busy, Wilson said, and the business also takes care of ice machines and air conditioners.

Wilson is managing the store and its 12 employees for three owners — Dennis Heck, Jim Thramer and Duane Martin. Heck especially spends a great deal of time working with Hutterite colonies on the east side of the state.

“There are about 150 different colonies we work with,” Wilson said. “They have things like big walk-in coolers, and families each have their own coolers. And china for pretty much everyone.”

Wilson said he would be happy to see an increase in retail customers to help deal with the “soft blow” that happens in the winter months when restaurant business is down.

He said newcomers to the store often take their time poring over the kitchen merchandise.

“People will spend an hour here and just buy a knife,” he said. “They’ll say, ‘I didn’t know you had all this stuff.

“They’ve built the business over the last 20 years,” he said of retail customers.

Tri-State, on Cooperative Way behind Flathead Electric Cooperative in Evergreen, has kitchen items in stock but also caters heavily to fans of specialty drinks.

It does a great deal of business with local coffee stands, though manager Shelly Smith said the kiosks have expanded their lines so much that calling it the coffee business is misleading, since a wide spectrum of beverage products now go into keeping coffee stands supplied.

“We don’t refer to it as ‘coffee’ service ... we carry a lot of chais, teas, smoothies, frozen lemonades,” Smith said, adding that Tri-State has a salesperson with a culinary background who can help kiosks and others in the beverage business come up with inventive drinks.

“People have to be creative, and people want something fun and different for summer.”

Taking into account the many brands, Smith estimates that Tri-State carries 4,500 varieties of syrup and at $4.99 a bottle for the Torani variety, many customers drop by the store to pick up a few bottles for home use every week, she said.

Tri-State sells and services espresso machines, a “huge part of what we do,” Smith said. “There are a lot of those machines out there.”

Owner and co-founder Jim Bliss, who has 30 years of experience in restaurant equipment, is an expert in repair of kitchen machines, Smith said, so he’s traveling constantly.

Tri-State helps keep coffee brewing at kiosks, restaurants and convenience stores. Churches are increasingly becoming customers, she said, as they add coffee bars to serve the membership. Keeping the espresso machine running is crucial for many businesses, so servicing commercial interests as soon as possible is a priority for Tri-State, Smith said.

Her business also offers free training to anyone who purchases equipment from Tri-State and is happy to help people set up and design their kiosks.

Smith had coffee experience with her own coffee kiosk in Kalispell, once called Java To Go, as well as a mobile kiosk at Blacktail Mountain Ski Area for five years.

The other major niche for the business has it carrying “anything related to ice cream,” Smith said, as long as it doesn’t require refrigeration.

Tri-State just set up a new yogurt store in Polson, Espress Yo Self, and there are Dairy Queens throughout the United States that rely on Tri-State for parts for its ice-cream machines.

With its two stores in Kalispell and Billings, Tri-State deals with customers throughout Montana. The Tri-State name comes from its standing as an Electro Freeze dealer, which is soft-serve ice cream equipment that it deals in the panhandle of Idaho, eastern Washington and Montana.

One of the products that really launched Tri-State in the Billings area was its standing as a Cooper’s chicken breading supplier. A salesperson was selling pallets of breading like crazy on the east side of the state, so they set up a presence in Billings eight years ago, and about 5 1/2 years ago started the store there. Tri-State employ 10 people between the two stores.

Tri-State opened its doors 15 years ago in a much smaller space off of Meridian Road in Kalispell.

Smith said the business outgrew that building very quickly and built its current space eight years ago. Ten thousand feet were added on a few years after it was constructed.

Business reporter Heidi Gaiser may be reached at 758-4439 or by email at hgaiser@dailyinterlake.com.