People + Food equals success for Eric Young‘s Harborside Deli

Nov. 9, 2005

Eric Young was a man with a plan, even back in his college days.
Originally from Holton, Michigan, aspiring hospitality enthusiast Young graduated from Muskegon Community College with an associates degree in hospitality management, and then topped that off with an associates degree in business from Petoskey’s North Central Michigan College.
Following college, Young took a job as a line cook at Stafford’s Perry-Davis Hotel, determined to learn all the tricks of the trade. That willingness to learn the restaurant business from the bottom up paid off. As a result of his hard work, he was promoted twice in his first year, eventually becoming the Perry’s food and beverage director, a position he held for two-and-a-half years. And after his tenure at Stafford’s had taught him all it could, Young moved on to become the head chef at Petoskey’s Villa Ristorante Italiano, a position he held for another two years.
It takes a lot of determination to stick with a plan like that, especially in the grueling and often-fickle world of the food services industry. But Young knew what he wanted to set his sights on -- owning his own gourmet foods-related business -- and that’s exactly what he’s done years later with his own Harborside Deli just outside of Bay Harbor.

BUILDING A CLIENTELE
The year 2000 was the year that Eric Young took the first step towards realizing his goal. He leased a 600-square-foot space in the Four Corner Market, a space that had a previous “life” as nothing more than the broken-down remnants of a half-hearted deli.
Young refurbished the little space, renamed it, and made it his own, staying there for two years, slowly building up clientele and continuing to polish his already well-respected reputation. When Four Corner Market decided to add on to the building, they offered the space to rent to Young, who promptly snapped it up for Harborside Deli, version two.
“Our deli and catering business had already, thankfully, grown by then,” he remembers, “and we definitely needed more space, so we were very quick to accept his offer and move over.”
Bright, friendly, and vaguely European in feel, the “new” Harborside Deli gives off a feeling of freshness that’s easily matched by the equally fresh foodstuffs that Young and his crew offer. Patrons can sit down for lunch at one of the high, round tables, warmly lit by small red glass hanging lamps and surrounded by framed photos and intricate hand-painted vines that twine around the tops of the windows. They can also simply carry out everything from a lunch for one to enough delicious ingredients to serve an entire dinner party - or they can leave it up to Young and his crew to take those party-planning duties right off of their hands.

30 SANDWICHES
“We are, first of all, a full-line deli retail shop,” Young explains, “we offer several salads and around 30 different sandwiches - a couple of local favorites are our specialty chicken salad and our great veggie wrap - and we’ve got lots of phenomenal deli items for every palate.”
A quick look around the small but efficiently set-up shop confirms that everything from snack chips to hard-to-find Toblerone chocolates, deli salads to high-end specialty meats and cheeses, are all attractively displayed and ready for purchase.
“Our catering service is the other important component of the business,” Young continues, “we offer our Personal Chef Service for smaller groups, where we come in with a server and a bartender, I’ll cook, and we’ll do the whole thing on site. And we can do bigger events, as well, cocktail parties, weddings, special events,” Young smiles, “we do it all.”
And the region is quickly figuring out how both reliable and delicious Harborside Deli’s offerings are. They were recently selected to cater an exclusive surprise engagement party at which pop band Hootie and the Blowfish were the entertainment for the evening, they’ve catered numerous yacht parties from “Up North” to Traverse City, and one client even flew Young to West Bloomfield to cater an event at which the guests, too, were flown in by private plane.
“We get to do lots of very interesting events,” Young enthuses, “something that was really big this year, for instance, were ‘white parties,’ where everyone dresses in white. It’s never a boring job, that’s for certain.”
He’s already considering expansion this winter, and may take a little bit of time off during the slower season to recharge his batteries from his extremely busy summer, and to think about the best way to pursue his next Harborside Deli move.
“The bottom line is, I really do love people and food, in that order,” he chuckles, “I saw an opportunity out here by Bay Harbor for a very friendly, very high quality gourmet deli, and I’m grateful that we have the business that we do. That makes all the effort worthwhile.”

Harborside Deli and Catering is located right next to Four Corner Market, at 3916 Charlevoix Avenue, just outside of the
Bay Harbor main entrance, telephone
231-347-1500.