Restaurants have been part of Salvatore Fancello’s life from the time he was a youngster growing up in Sardinia.
Fancello, owner of Salvatore’s La Spaghetteria in New Westminster, is getting set to retire on Aug. 1. He feels blessed to have been able to work at a job he loves for so many years.
“Loving this business that is the best part. I don’t wish anybody to do something they don’t like to do,” he said. “Since I was 12 years old, I have been working in this business. In Italy, I was behind the bar making coffees, making gelati.”
Fancello started working in hotels in Sardinia when he was 14; he later immigrated to Belgium, where he worked in restaurants in Brussels.
“I came to Canada 53 years ago,” he said. “I went to Montreal for seven years. I worked in the best restaurants there.”
Fed up with the ongoing debate about whether Quebec should separate from Canada, Fancello headed west in 1970 and worked as a waiter in the Bayside Room at the Bayshore hotel for several years. When the restaurant closed, Fancello and a co-worker/friend decided to open a restaurant of their own in New Westminster.
Fancello has been a fixture on Sixth Street since 1976, when he opened La Lorraine at 232 Sixth St.
“We bought this house for $80,000. People were living in it,” he said of 232 Sixth St. “We kept the shell. We hired an architect and switched it to a restaurant.”
In 1979, Fancello and his former business partner bought the house next door for $175,000 and opened La Rustica.
“As soon as we opened the doors there was a lineup,” he said of the restaurants. “It was amazing, so successful.”
In 1991, Fancello noticed a decline in the trend of fine dining and merged La Rustica and La Lorraine into one building and opened Savatore’s La Spaghetteria next door.
“Over the years each one had its own run, very successfully,” he said. “We used to have dine and dance. New Year’s Eve we used to probably do 600 people in one night.”
Customers’ appetites on the restaurant scene have changed a lot since the days of dining and dancing. Nowadays, Fancello said people often frequent chain restaurants likes Cactus Club and Browns Socialhouse.
La Spaghetteria has a staff of 12, some who have been with the Fancello for 20 to 38 years. Forty years after opening on Sixth Street, he continues to work day-and-night seven days a week.
“I did dishes yesterday. I make the pizza, I do the barbecue every day – lunch and dinner. I serve people. I clean tables. I do preparation. I do shopping. I still love it,” he said. “I have been so lucky to do something I love to do.”
Fancello sold the properties to Quadra Homes two years ago and the sites are slated for redevelopment into La Rustica Residences. Although he’s set to close the restaurant on Aug. 1, he’s pondered the possibility of opening a smaller restaurant after visiting family in Sardinia and going on a couple of trips with his wife Maria.
“I am not ready,” he said of retiring. “I may take time to recharge the batteries, go back home to Italy. I may come back and reopen something smaller – maybe 40 to 50 seats.”
When La Spaghettria closes its doors, Fancello will be putting some of the restaurant’s equipment into a large storage container – just in case he opens a smaller restaurant. The rest of the equipment, appliances, dishes and furnishings will be sold.
“There were no plans how many years I was going to be,” he said of his move to Sixth Street in 1976. “Usually life of the restaurant doesn’t last that long. You have to anticipate the tastes of the people. The mood changes so you have to change with the people.”
