This takes the cake: Dairy Queen Chill & Grill for sale
It's bittersweet, she said.
Not the cakes. The ice cream cakes are glorious. Jenn Schubert Spencer's been making them for decades at the Dairy Queen Grill & Chill, 2770 Dundee Road, in Northbrook.
Some DQ restaurants receive the premade versions shipped from a corporate warehouse. Not at the Grill & Chill. Jenn makes those herself.
"I love doing it," she said.
It's a labor of love that quiets some of the stress in her life. At this point, though, 48 years after her parents, Ed and Susan Schubert, bought the franchise on June 1, 1974 - and more than five years since Jenn assumed ownership on the first day of 2017 with her father retaining 1% of the company - the stress is winning.
She and her husband, Brent, got married at the Grill & Chill on March 24, 2002. Jenn started working there around 5, toasting buns for sandwiches at lunchtime, she and her sisters careful not to cross that line between the front and back of the house.
She's got employees who are important to her.
Things like that are why it's hard for her to put the business up for sale.
After informing her employees, on May 22 Schubert Spencer announced on Facebook she was selling the Dairy Queen Grill & Chill, located in the Dunbrook Center strip mall. Asking price is $450,000.
"It's just something that needs to be done," she said. Still "my sounding board," her father agreed with the decision to sell.
There are several reasons.
There are ongoing health concerns for both Jenn, a breast cancer survivor, and Brent, who nearly lost a leg in a 2012 motorcycle crash and can't help out at the restaurant.
Rising inflation and labor costs weigh in, but at a store that increased profits and added employees during the pandemic, the health issues are the main factor, Jenn said.
"The stress of that, that stress of working, the stress of owning - I had to eliminate something," she said.
She has a caveat.
"It's kind of bittersweet for me, and that's why I want to stay involved with the restaurant in any capacity. If any owner comes in, I'd want to stay on and make the cakes, and help manage the store," she said.
"It's just the stress of the paper work and the accounting, and just the daily operations of the office work. I can't keep up with it on top of running the store as well."
It is not a matter of "if" a new owner comes in, but when. And it's likely to be soon.
In less than two days since she announced her intention to sell, she said seven interested suitors had reached out to her, including a couple of Northbrook residents.
"I like that because they know what we're about and they'll continue our legacy," Jenn said.
It's a legacy of tradition, hands-on ownership and involvement with and investment in a community which, when the going got tough, her neighbors repaid.
"I'm going out on top. I don't want to go out on the bottom. I've seen all the businesses that failed or closed during the pandemic, and I'm so grateful I'm not one of them," Schubert Spencer said.
"And that's the Northbrook community. They would not let us fail. They just kept coming."