Frank Giuffrida, Owned Hilltop Steak House, 86

[DGH]

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Frank Giuffrida, the founder of Hilltop Steak House, a cavernous
eatery in Saugus, Massachusetts, that became a favorite of meat-loving
motorists and admirers of roadside kitsch, died Wednesday, December
31, 2003, at North Shore Medical Center in Lynn, Massachusetts, one
day after suffering a stroke, at the age of 86.

One of the busiest restaurants in the country, the 1,400-seat Hilltop
is noted for generous portions of beef and its 68-foot neon cactus
sign that towers over Route 1 and a nearby herd of life-size
fiberglass cattle.

The cactus, with 210 fluorescent light bulbs and nearly a half-mile of
neon tubing, has long been billed as the biggest sign on Route 1 north
of Boston. It is familiar to many who never ate at the Hilltop.

But Mr. Giuffrida's fortune was built on beef, not signage.

"Frank was a genius, " Peter G. Christie, president and CEO of the
Massachusetts Restaurant Association, said yesterday. "He used very
high-quality beef, he served it family style and made it incredibly
affordable."

Mr. Giuffrida made sure the portions were always generous at the
Hilltop.

"My meatcutter went on vacation, and I took his place for a few weeks,
" Mr. Giuffrida recalled in a story published in the Globe in 1987.
"It wasn't long before the chef came out back to see what was going
on. 'I knew it had to be you, Frank,' he said. `You are making the
steaks heavier.'"

He said businesses should reflect the owner's personality. "I am
generous by nature, and I say that in all modesty. If I get a deal, I
pass it on to the customer."

And the public beat a path to his door. In the 1970s and '80s, the
Hilltop was serving 20,000 customers a week.

"He built an empire, and he did it because he loved the customer, he
loved the industry and loved giving a good value," said Christie.

Few left the Hilltop without a doggie bag. In the mid-1980s, the
restaurant was spending $20,000 a year on paper bags emblazoned with
the Hilltop's cactus logo.

For several years in the 1970s and '80s, the Hilltop was the highest
grossing independent restaurant in the country, according to
Restaurant and Institution, a trade magazine that reported that the
restaurant grossed $26.9 million in 1986.

According to a story published in The New York [New York] Times in
1988, each week Hilltop customers consumed 20,500 pounds of beef,
14,500 pounds of salad, 17,500 pounds of baked potatoes, 3,500 pounds
of butter, and 4,000 pounds of tomatoes.

The meals were prepared by a staff of about 600, including more than
300 waitresses and 50 chefs.

"Everybody called him Frank," said Mr. Giuffrida's daughter, Santina
Primavera of Lynnfield.

And he knew everybody's name. "Dishwashers, waitresses, executives,
everybody," said Primavera. "He considered them family."

Mr. Giuffrida had a penthouse at the restaurant, but he spent most of
his time in a glass-walled office on the ground floor in order to be
closer to his customers. He spent countless hours at the restaurant
but always slipped away to have dinner with his two daughters and to
put them to bed, according to his other daughter Gina Noto, also of
Lynnfield, Massachusetts.

He was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts. He dropped out of school after
the fifth grade to help out in the family meat business when his
father became ill.

"My family on both sides was in the meat business, but I always wanted
to have a restaurant," he explained in a story published in The New
York Times in 1988.

He said he chose the location in Saugus "because I counted the cars
driving along Route 1 and saw a business opportunity."

He bought Gyro's, which he described as a "gin mill," in about 1947
and transformed it in 1961 into the Hilltop. At the beginning, his
wife, the former Irene Sozio, was his hostess.