Back in the early 1970s, Peter Hastings and his wife owned an antique shop in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood called Hindsight where he repaired old potbelly stoves. The couple started using one of these refurbished stoves to make toasted sandwiches for their customers, which, as it turned out, became a bigger draw than the antiques. By 1977, they’d converted the store into a neighborhood sandwich shop, Potbelly Sandwich Works, that often had lines around the block for the signature sandwiches, homemade desserts, and the live music the Hastings featured in the shop.
This neighborhood spot, billed as “A First Class Dive” by its sign, would eventually become the chain Potbelly Sandwich Works. So if you thought its unique name was a reference to what you might get from chowing down on too many of its toasted sandwiches, salads, hand-scooped shakes, and Zapp’s brand potato chips, you’d be wrong. It was named for the stoves the Hastings once specialized in repairing. Still, it wasn’t the owners that took the sandwich shop nationwide, but one of their customers.
An Expanding Potbelly
Bryant Keil, who owned a food delivery service, approached Peter Hastings in 1995 about buying the original Potbelly Sandwich Works (via the Chicago Tribune ). They eventually made a deal. Kiel bought the shop for $1.7 million and began slowly scaling up. His friends and family thought he was crazy. He opened a second location in 1997, and by 2005, there were more than 100 stores spread across nine states and Washington D.C.
Kiel kept many elements from the original antique-store-turned-restaurant, like vintage design elements and live music. He retired as CEO in 2008, but returned in 2023 as a franchisee with his son, Hampden, and owns nearly 30 locations in and around Washington, D.C. Potbelly went public in 2013 and while it’s had its ups and downs, the sandwich chain is continuing to grow. As of this article’s writing, there are 445 locations in the United States. And although the store designs are a bit slicker than the original, and you’re not going to hear any live music anymore, you will find a potbelly stove on premises that harks back to the restaurant’s origins…