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WILKES-BARRE TWP. — The space will be bigger and in a higher traffic area for the second location of the Red Leaf Salad Co. in the Arena Hub Plaza.
Rich Samanas, one of the founders of the Dallas-based company, said the business owners are aiming for a January 2017 opening.
“We’re ready to grow,” Samanas said Friday. “That’s our next step, moving forward.”
For the past two years and eight months, Samanas and his wife, Allison, and Aaron and Jennifer Chesonis have been sharpening their skills and providing fresh and healthy food at their Tunkhannock Highway/state Route 309 restaurant to people from throughout Northeastern Pennsylvania. The opportunity arose to move into the Arena Hub Plaza, situated in the restaurant and retail district that has developed around the Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza in Wilkes-Barre Township.
The second restaurant will be nearly 4,000 square feet and have between 50 and 60 employees, more than double the Dallas workforce, Samanas said.
The restaurant will expand the menu of causal dining eateries for shoppers and workers, said Robert Tamburro, general partner with TFP Limited, owner of the plaza.
The Outback Steak House and Olive Garden are located in the shopping plaza off Mundy Street.
“I think what makes this one interesting, it gives another option,” Tamburro said. “They offer salads and soups with an emphasis on healthy eating.”
Space became available when Sleepy’s lease came up and the mattress store moved to nearby Mundy Street Square, another TFP property, Tamburro said. The vacant space was subdivided with Great Clips taking approximately 1,400 square feet and Red Leaf occupying the remaining 3,600 square feet, he said.