It is official – PJ Whelihan’s Pub and Restaurant is opening its 20th location at the former Via Marconi Sports Bar and Pizza Pub location at Hatfield Pointe Shopping Center on Forty Foot Road later this summer, as announced on Facebook Tuesday.
According to its post, the location is actively hiring, with interviews starting Wednesday, June 29.
“While we anxiously await opening, we are currently searching for enthusiastic individuals to join our team,” stated the post.
PJ Whelihan’s will hold on-site interviews at the TD Ameritrade location in Hatfield Pointe from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Interested applicants can walk in, but a copy of a resume is required. Applicants can also apply on Indeed.
PJ Whelihan’s is hiring line cooks, dishwashers, servers, bartenders and a kitchen manager for its new Hatfield location.
PJW Restaurant Group — the South Jersey holding company founded by Bob and Donna Platzer in 1983 whose portfolio includes 26 various brands of P.J. Whelihan’s Pub and Restaurant, The Pour House, The ChopHouse Grille, and Central Taco and Tequila across eastern Pennsylvania and South Jersey — was purchased in December by New York investment firm Garnett Station Partners, according to the Philadelphia Business Journal.
Garnett Station Partners’ portfolio includes equity partnerships and credit investments in businesses like P.F. Chang’s, Mambo Seafood, Twin Peaks, Fat Tuesday, Checkers, and Planet Fitness, per the article.
Via Marconi Pizza Pub closed its doors in May after 30 years in business, and rumors were rampant that PJ Whelihan’s had purchased the property, but those rumors could not be confirmed by Via Marconi ownership.
“Thanks for a whole lot of great years and for helping to make ‘The Pub’ the best place in town! Until we meet again,” stated a Via Marconi Facebook post in April.
In May 2021, Via Marconi Pizza Pub Inc. was awarded a $40,000 grant from the Redevelopment Authority of Montgomery County through the MontcoStrong 2021 Pennsylvania Hospitality Industry Recovery Program.
In 2019, Via Marconi Pizza Pub was ordered to pay more than $360,000 in back overtime wages and liquidated damages to 25 employees, following an investigation by the United States Department of Labor’s Work and Hour Division. The employees failed to receive overtime pay between July 2, 2016, and March 23, 2019, according to the judgement.
“This employer failed to pay overtime to kitchen staff who regularly worked 46 to 73 hours per week. Our work ensures that employees are paid all the wages they have legally earned,” said Wage and Hour District Director James Cain, in Philadelphia.
“This case should remind other employers to evaluate their own practices to ensure they comply with the law. Violations and penalties like those in this case can be avoided.”
In addition to the judgement, WHD also assessed a $21,398 civil penalty against Via Marconi Pizza Pub, The judgement also prohibits further violations of the provisions stated in the Fair Labor Standards Act, according to the release.
In 2012, Tom Vickerman, who at the time had owned Via Marconi Pizza Pub since 2007 and told Towamencin supervisors it has been in business for more than 25 years, took his business out of Towamencin Township Shopping Village and found a new home at the burgeoning Hatfield Pointe Shopping Center at 190 Forty Foot Road in Hatfield Township alongside Lowe’s, Autozone and ShopRite. He opened in summer 2012 with a 250-person indoor capacity, plus 90 more outdoors.
He told The Reporter that year the reason for the move to the Clemens Family Corporation-owned shopping center: “Considering the condition of the mall itself and the lack of any foot traffic whatsoever, I think the location we’re looking at moving to is far superior.”
See also:
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