Seguino’s enhances its quality service

Before he acquired Seguino’s on Feb. 26, 1992, Peter Calore contacted the staff and discussed with them what new ownership would mean. Calore intended to make the restaurant a premiere facility in the Greater Bangor Area; he let his staff know “early on that I couldn’t succeed without their help.”

Since then, he and the staff have incorporated changes designed to make a Seguino’s dining experience more enjoyable for customers. Taking time on a busy autumn afternoon to discuss Seguino’s, Calore detailed just what’s been done to improve a restaurant already well-known for its service and cuisine:

“The level of service has improved,” Calore said.

He quickly involved the staff “in making decisions and in generating ideas as to how we can do this better. The employees are responsible for making many decisions, especially the day-to-day, on-the-spot decisions that make or break a restaurant.

“Their sole responsibility is to satisfy the customer,” Calore stressed. “We want everybody who comes in here to enjoy themselves.

“I’ve always looked at service as the most important ingredient in getting this restaurant to work the way I want,” he said. “Industry studies routinely show that customers recall the service better than they do what they ate”;

The sign outside the restaurant, the menu, and Calore’s business card all herald another change: a simple, well-designed logo that symbolizes Seguino’s for patrons, employees, and suppliers alike.

The logo incorporates a red tomato framed by a window. Calore derived the concept “from my experience growing up in an Italian family outside of Boston, always envisioning tomatoes ripening on a windowsill, tomatoes to be made into pasta sauce.

“This became our logo,” he said. Calore rough-sketched the logo and gave the drawing to a college friend of his oldest son, Tim. Studying to become a graphic artist, the young man created the Seguino’s logo, now a registered trademark;

Patrons will find some subtle changes to the interior decor. To make the restaurant accessible for the handicapped, Calore constructed an entrance ramp and enlarged the restrooms. Many changes were suggested by his wife, Diane, who has been involved with the restaurant since arriving in Maine last June.

Seguino’s features two separate dining areas: an atrium located beside the main entrance and traditional dining rooms set closer to Main Street. Patrons entering the latter rooms will pass a new wine cabinet that holds 250 bottles. According to Calore, Seguino’s stocks 60 different wines;

The greatest changes have occurred with what really counts with diners: the menu. During the first two months that he owned the restaurant, “I talked with 75-80 percent of the customers, finding out what they ate,” Calore said.

The staff tracked every menu item ordered by their patrons. “From that, we narrowed the menu down to what our customers really want,” Calore noted.

To improve the dinner menu, Seguino’s added “five new items that were very popular specials in the past,” Calore said. By this fall, similar changes were incorporated into the lunch menu, and wine prices were cut by up to 40 percent.

“We want our customers to enjoy wine with their meals,” Calore stressed.

“We kept the prices on the menu either exactly the same, or we lowered them,” he said. “Nothing has gone up in price.”

Calore chuckled when asked what menu change had made the biggest hit with his clientele. “The secret’s in the sauce,” he whispered. Refusing to divulge exactly what has been done to the sauce, Calore mentioned that “we changed the ingredients slightly — it’s a secret recipe of mine — and changed the cooking process.

“Customer reaction has been overwhelmingly positive,” he said.

“We’re still changing things as customers indicate their desires,” Calore stated. “We’re changing to improve the menu all the time.”

Before he bought Seguino’s, Calore asked some family and friends from the Boston area to visit the restaurant one Sunday. Today, he occasionally takes a similar tact, arriving at Seguino’s in the evening and walking past diners who have just finished eating in his restaurant.

Calore readily smiled and explained, “I’ll pretend that I’m just getting here to eat. I’ll ask people, `What’s this restaurant like? Is the food good? What about the service?’

“I haven’t heard a negative comment yet,” Calore stated. “That tells me a lot about what people think of us.”