Brookie’s Café opens in downtown SJ March 27

Opening new restaurants is becoming a habit for Jake Arnold.

When Arnold and his wife Brooke open Brookie’s Café in downtown St. Joseph on Thursday, March 27, it will be their fifth opening in two years. Arnold says when you work hard and ‘live your faith’ opportunities present themselves.

Arnold was a sales representative in the region for Gordon’s Food Service, calling on restaurant owners and managers for three years. He was observing best practices every day, thinking how he might put them to good use in the future. In 2023, one of his customers, a convenience store owner in Twin Lakes near Dowagiac, decided to retire and offered the business for sale to Arnold. That’s how Happy Jake’s was born—still a convenience store but with more food added.

Then came an opportunity to purchase Amy’s Fabulous Diner in Marcellus, now Wakey Jake’s restaurant. Followed by Lutz’s Drive In at Sister Lakes, now re-imagined as Arnie’s Drive In and open for the season. Most recently, in 2024, the Arnold’s took over an existing restaurant in Dowagiac, gave it a makeover and opened the first Brookie’s Café. While named for Arnold’s wife, Brooke, her focus remains at home with the couple’s two sons while Jake manages the growing chain of eateries.

Now, Brookie’s Cafe expands to St. Joseph, taking over the former ‘Kingfisher’ restaurant space at 210 State Street in the heart of the downtown business district. Arnold told MoodyOnTheMarket.com that he and his team are excited to ‘move up’ to a bigger business platform, more and even better competition and an opportunity to serve a wide range of customers, both locals and tourists. Arnold likened the expansion to St. Joseph as ‘moving up to Triple-A ball’, using an old baseball analogy. He said the 45 members of the Jake’s Restaurant Group team are ready!

Brookie’s in St. Joseph will be a breakfast and lunch spot, open from 8 am to 2 pm. Arnold has observed other successful restaurants and doesn’t mind saying he’ll pattern Brookie’s after The Mason Jar Café in Benton Harbor and the Panera chain—two known quantities with a strong track record of success and loyal customers.

Popular items on the Dowagiac Brookie’s menu will be the starting point here, says Jake:

“For breakfast, our most popular item is the Beeson Street Blend. That’s two eggs, potato, ham, bacon, sausage, onion, green pepper, shredded cheese and gravy. Like, it’s kind of like all that in one.”

At lunch, the accent will be on sandwiches and salads:

“Lunch is honestly our most popular side of the menu. If you think of McAllister’s or Panera, that’s our lunch menu. Fresh soups and salads– there’s no burgers. Fresh soups, salads, sandwiches, and we’ve got a bunch of paninis. The Crispy and Ccreamy BLT is a huge one. That’s a BLT with avocado and garlic aioli on multi-grain bread. And then people love our mac and cheese, it’s in-house made.”

Jake says they are creating a comfortable, leisurely vibe in redecorating the State Street space. There’ll be plenty of room for sit-down customers, groups of various size. But he also realizes people often don’t have the time to sit, so grab & go’ will be an important side-feature at Brookie’s:

“Right by the front door counter we’ll have this reach-in cooler, two of them, actually. We’re going to have fresh sandwiches made every day, fresh salads, fresh wraps… where you can come in and grab it right here. At the counter, you’ll just say, ‘Hey, I’d like one of these, one of those.’ We’ll cash you out right there ne and quick. We’ve noticed there’s a lack downtown for quick high-quality sandwiches and drinks, so those reach-in coolers with sandwiches, fresh drinks and lemonades and will address that!”

Brookie’s will be geared up for main menu online, take-out orders utilizing the Square app, with the items placed on a special clearly marked shelf up front.

“ You just come in and grab it. You don’t have to talk to anyone. It’s already paid online on the Square app. Then, you grab your food or drink off the shelf. It’s ready to go for local business people downtown who just want to come in and get back to work real quick!”

Jake Arnold is proud of his menu, but first and foremost, he’s proud of his people, and willing to invest in them.

“They say the biggest issue in the restaurant industry is the people, so I’m going to focus on the people. We created a leadership development course through Jake’s Restaurant Group that our staff goes through. All my eight managers are reading leadership books. They have communication training that we go through, teaching, training, and developing our people first. And then we develop the processes on how to run the business and then we price the products. So, I’ve kind of flipped that on its head and really focused on the culture of JRG, which then comes back in customer service and attitude.”

Jake has hired ‘another Jake’, Jake Taylor as the General Manager of Brookie’s Café in St. Joseph. Taylor reports to Mike Mahaffey, who oversees both the Dowagiac and St. Joseph restaurants. Overall, JRG employs about 45 full and part-time.

Clearly, Jake Arnold is an ambitious, energetic young entrepreneur, so we asked him what drives him forward.

“Everything comes back to my faith. I’ll key in on something here– we just closed Sundays. And that is like complete opposite of what everyone says in the restaurant industry, because that was, in fact, our busiest day in some locations. Three reasons: to honor God, to show that we value faith over our finances, and to give our employees rest and allow them the opportunity to go to church. It’s what we believe and what we do in practice!”