The crowd outside of Mr. Everything continued to grow as City of Atlanta council member Byron Amos talked about what the restaurant means to the Westside Village neighborhood it has been in the past 30 years. Amos and many others were braving a cold morning temperature to celebrate Mr. Everything’s 30th anniversary of business on the west side.
Mr. Everything was established across the street from its current home in 1993. The family-owned business was started by husband and wife Jason and Monica Smith as a way to offer a more healthy dining option for customers in the Atlanta University Center and surrounding neighborhoods, said Jason, a native of Queens, New York.
“It feels good because the community supports us and we are proud that the community continues to support us,” Jason said as people streamed inside the two-story restaurant. On the second floor of the restaurant a pull-apart cake designed to look like the “Mr.Everything” logo was on a table.
“It feels amazing,” Monica said of the celebration. “When we started this business in 1993 our goal was to serve the community. That still stands today.”
There are three other Mr. Everything locations in Fairburn, Fayetteville, and a second Atlanta location on Greenbriar Parkway. Monica says the family is looking forward to the coming year with plans for the restaurant to expand in 2024.
Monica said the business was trying to open a location inside Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport before the Covid pandemic hit in 2021 and those plans were put on hold. There are also plans to open five more locations next year, including inside the country’s busiest airport” she said.
“We are very humbled to still be here and excited about the future,” said Monica. The couple has eight children and 10 grandchildren, some of whom were on-site for the ribbon-cutting. “They were so excited to cut the ribbon,” said Monica.
Five Atlanta Police Department officers walked into the restaurant with one thing on their minds: lunch. They too were at Mr. Everything to celebrate three decades of business in the community. Upon seeing them enter, City of Atlanta Executive Director of the Office of Constituent Services Greg Clay joked to a friend, “This is the safest place in the city right now.”
An Atlanta native, Clay was there to present a proclamation from the city to the Smiths. He had been coming to Mr. Everything since he was in high school and said he understood what the restaurant meant to the community then and now.
“30 years of quality food and customer service for any type of small business is a huge accomplishment,” Clay said. “Not only that, but they are community folks.”
Photo by Kerri Phox/The Atlanta Voice
Shade` Jones, chair of neighborhood planning unit L, said Mr. Everything’s success, growth, and solid business practices “is a great statement for what can happen in our community.”
“It’s really exciting to see the expansion within our community,” she added. “It’s an optimistic example for the businesses in this community.”
Mr. Everything has been on the right side and the left side of Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive, near the Atlanta University Center. Jones said that means it has been a part of two different neighborhood planning units during three decades of serving its popular rice-based meals and sandwiches, but one thing has remained the same, she says. “They have always been on the west side,” Jones said.