If you dined “out” (i.e., dine in-venue, pickup, or delivery) at a different restaurant for all three meals every single day of the year, equating to 1,095 restaurants, you still would not have tried every venue in New York City. With over 27,000 restaurants in the Big Apple, you will have only sampled about 1/25th of the total. It’s important to note that roughly 80% of new restaurants close within their first year. So, this begs the question: “What does it take to compete on the world’s biggest plate?” The answer? Stratis Morfogen.
Stratis Morfogen has long been known as the “Disruptor,” or rebel, in the hospitality game. He literally redefined how New Yorkers, and Americans in general, look at upscale Chinese fare; helped shape the restaurant and bar scene in New York throughout the ’90s into the next decade, taking on the mob; opened one of the most successful steakhouse operations in the world; launched a wildly successful dumpling-specific franchise and authored two books! That doesn’t even include the dozens of other hospitality operations he has launched over his storied career. And even after some 35+ years in the business, Stratis is still making waves, this time by opening Diner24 in Gramercy a few months ago to breathe new life back into the very category where he started: the 24-hour Greek diner.
In the interest of full disclosure, I have been friends with Stratis for over 30 years and I have been to every single restaurant, lounge, club, outpost and postage stamp he has launched in that time. Given the almost 40 years I have spent hanging and working with 5-star chefs, legendary restaurateurs and iconic venue owners, I can tell you that Stratis is one of those legendary icons. You must also understand Stratis Morfogen’s background to understand such a powerful statement.
BORN TO DISRUPT
Stratis Morfogen was born in Queens and grew up in Garden City on Long Island. Coming from a long line of restaurateurs, Morfogen spent much of his upbringing at his father’s fourteen restaurants around New York (a couple of which I was a customer). So, to say hospitality and restaurants are in his blood would be a significant understatement. At 19, Stratis began his entrepreneurial journey by launching concessions and restaurants at a Long Island amusement park. Using a loan of $25,000 from his father, Morfogen grew the business’ revenue seven-fold before selling it.
While Stratis’ father was known for his seafood and Greek restaurants, John Morfogen made an indelible mark on the tri-state community with his Queens and Long Island diners. “When I was a teenager, my dad used to say to me that he didn’t want me to work in the restaurant or diner business. He wanted me to work at Bear Sterns or Lehman Brothers. That’s what every dad wanted for their sons back then. Obviously, I didn’t listen. It was something we even used to laugh about. And then both went bankrupt. I think I made the right choice,” Morfogen extolled. Despite his father’s misgivings, they opened Hilltop Diner in Queens after seeing the success that Stratis worked so hard to achieve with the amusement concession business.
Diners typically keep healthy margins and prices low by offering a large variety of dishes that utilize the same ingredients (capitalizing on economies of scale by ordering ingredients in bulk to keep costs low). Diners are meant to be approachable, cost-effective restaurants with diverse fare offerings. So, living up to what will later become Stratis’ moniker, “disruptor,” Stratis and his father took a gamble by installing a “name chef,” Gabriel Moran, at Hilltop Diner. That generated a lot of buzz and helped Hilltop become one of the most successful diner operations in the US.
GROWING THE MORFOGEN LEGEND
That triumph led Stratis to open Gotham Diner on the Upper East Side in 1993 and Rouge nightclub a year later in Manhattan. In 1997, with internet search engines growing in popularity, Stratis became addicted to Search Engine Optimization (SEO) because of its power to affect change for a business. Morfogen used SEO to put the Fulton Fish Market online as a digital commerce brand that year. He has since used SEO in every business he has opened (especially his latest Diner24 operation). No other operator during that time used SEO to grow business this way, relying strictly on legacy marketing tactics.
It was around 2004 that Morfogen met celebrity chef Phillipe Chow, with the pair opening Phillipe on East 60th Street between Madison and Park Avenues a year later. It quickly became the country’s highest-grossing restaurant per square foot and redefined how we all look at and enjoy upscale Chinese fare. Unfortunately, in a notorious court case, Phillipe Chow’s former employer, Michael Chow of Mr. Chow’s, sued the pair. Morfogen not only won the Chow v Chow case, but Michael Chow also had to pay the $3.5 million legal tab Morfogen incurred as that is Florida law (where the lawsuit was brought). A few years after, Stratis split from the enterprise because he, in his own words, “didn’t want to partner with the convicted felons that are part of Merchants Hospitality, which was in negotiations at the time.” Despite the manufactured controversy by Mr. Chow’s, the industry fall-out from the lawsuit and Stratis parting ways with Phillipe Chow, Morfogen was not done with hospitality or with disrupting the status quo.
Only a few short years later, in 2016, music executive Robert “Don Pooh” Cummins approached Stratis about opening an upscale brand at a space he owned in FiDi. “I didn’t want to just open another Chinese concept. I also wanted to prove that steakhouses still have life in them despite so many closings. But this had to be something different, something special,” said Stratis. Combining the flavors of a traditional steakhouse with Chinese flare is what that “something special” is, celebrity favorite Brooklyn Chop House (BCH). BCH has now grown to two large locations with waiting lists for reservations and several outposts opening across the globe in the next couple of years.
FIGHTING FOR THE LITTLE GUY
During the pandemic, he not only fed thousands of healthcare workers out of his own pocket, but he also took on disgraced former Governor Andrew Cuomo, former Mayor Bill de Blasio, Senator Chuck Schumer, and more for their COVID policies that were negatively affecting small business owners, particularly in the hospitality space. Morfogen also launched franchise operation Brooklyn Dumpling Shop (BDS) and released a book (Be a Disruptor: Streetwise Lessons for Entrepreneurs-from the Mob to Mandates; Skyhorse) while everyone else was home binging on Netflix.
“During COVID, we had government policy overriding common sense. How can a multi-location fast-casual burger chain get $10 million in forgivable PPP loans when they had a market cap of $1.5 billion, yet the thousands of mom-and-pop restaurants that filed for PPP loans were denied. Meanwhile, I fed over 8,000 healthcare workers, or heroes as we call them while getting Brooklyn Dumpling Shop open and finishing the book. The pandemic was the perfect time to disrupt the status quo in hospitality and get people together for a common good, helping small businesses to serve their customers,” the notorious operator said.
Brooklyn Dumpling Shop is now in partnership with “Mr. Wonderful” himself, world-renowned entrepreneur and Shark Tank star Kevin O’Leary. That partnership resulted in BDS going public on the Canadian stock market, exponential growth of franchise locations, and a frozen dumpling retail line in partnership with music icon Patti LaBelle that is sold at Walmart, Stew Leonard’s and many other fine retail locations.
RETURNING TO HIS ROOTS
Last year, Stratis called me to inform me that he was returning to the diner business. With the number of 24-hour diners and old-school coffee shops closing, it didn’t surprise me that Stratis saw an opportunity to disrupt the market, being crazy enough to return to this business. And it is that crazy, that chutzpah if you will, that will make Diner24 a resounding success.
“I literally opened this business based on SEO. Diner24 has it all built-in with just the name. There are a million people searching for a ‘24-hour diner’ or’ 24-hour burger’ within a 30-block radius of our location. If even 10% of that traffic comes in for a meal, we will always be busy,” said Morfogen. And if 2 pm on a Thursday during a heat wave is any indication, given that every table in the diner is taken up, then I would say Stratis’ “crazy” is what dreams are made of for a venue.
Combining over 35 years of experience, Stratis is not only serving up classic diner offerings but also modern takes on those classics (including one of the most delicious smash burgers I have ever had, crazy and over-the-top milkshakes and more) as well as some unique dishes packed with flavor such as the BBQ lamb ribs in spicy honey. Diner24 also serves some of the most unique and delicious hand-crafted specialty cocktails, as well as frozen cocktails (perfected during the pandemic at BCH and BDS). The service at Diner24 is top-notch, and Stratis leaves no detail unturned. Morfogen included elements of yesteryear diners like mini jukeboxes in booths with Bluetooth for your phone’s music, Coca-Cola branded napkin holders, and an old-school wall payphone to pump up the sense of nostalgia. And just like with every other operation Morfogen has launched, he is making tweaks along the way to perfection.
This fanboy has found his new regular haunt in Diner24. And I am not the only one. Due to the immense popularity of Diner24, Stratis has been fielding calls from other operators, franchise companies and investors wanting to open another outpost. Only time will tell, but it’s a safe bet that we will see much more from Diner24 in the coming years.
THE LEGEND
To this journalist, what cemented Morfogen as a true icon and legend isn’t just the immensely successful businesses he has owned and operated. It is the tenacity, passion, ethics and dedication he has always operated with alongside his compassion and love for our city, her People, and those who are fortunate enough to work for him.
When I first met Stratis in the early ’90s, I had already been to a couple of his father’s restaurants. Seeing what he did at Gotham Diner and having worked with him in a promotional capacity, I already knew what everyone else would eventually learn: Stratis Morfogen is the definition of an industry icon and the stuff of which legends are made.