Shady’s Burgers & Brewhaha started with five neighbors, a backyard fire pit and a few beers.
That was 2012, in the Canyon Creek neighborhood of Richardson. Greg Cooney, Don Bouvier, Anthony Bolner, Dave Swiney and Steve Gumbert were sitting around Bolner’s fire pit talking about what the neighborhood was missing. What they landed on was a place with good burgers, cold beer and a patio where families could hang out on a weeknight. None of them had ever run a restaurant.
The partners raised nearly all the money to open from friends and neighbors in Canyon Creek, and they did it in about a month. To make up for their lack of restaurant experience, they brought in a consultant who knew a thing or two about Dallas burgers: Larry Lavine, the man who founded Chili’s. The five of them held taste tests at each other’s houses until the menu felt right…