The owner of an iconic Chicago steakhouse has filed a breach of contract lawsuit accusing Midway Airport’s master concessionaire of using the Gene & Georgetti name to secure an airport contract — only to terminate the agreement to make way for airport slot machines, damaging the restaurant’s brand.
Michelle Durpetti’s grandfather, Gene Michelotti, founded Gene & Georgetti Restaurant at 500 N. Franklin in 1941 with his partner, Alfredo Federighi, who was nicknamed Georgetti after a famous Italian cyclist. The restaurant is a Chicago institution, one of the city’s oldest steakhouses.
Durpetti now owns and operates the family-owned business. The restaurant also has a partnership with SSP America, a partner in the consortium that serves as master concessionaire at Midway Airport, to lend its name and brand to the 3,979-square-foot airport restaurant known as Gene’s Bistro.
In exchange for everything that the Gene & Georgetti brand is known for — from its recipes, menu, tradition and expertise to the look and feel of the Midway restaurant — Gene & Georgetti gets 5% of gross monthly sales.
Seven months ago, Durpetti was informed by SSP America that Gene’s Bistro would be “closing in the coming months,” and that her 20-year brand license agreement for the eatery was being terminated with 15 years left on the pact.
The fact that Gene’s Bistro is still open and still paying Gene & Georgetti the monthly fee — without providing sales records — did not discourage Durpetti from taking what she calls her “David vs. Goliath” fight against the concession giant to the next level.
“They leveraged our reputation, our status, the fact that we’re women-owned — to strengthen that bid and win the bid, then moved on to something better when it appeared,” Durpetti told the Sun-Times Tuesday.
“I can’t say for sure exactly what it was that appeared. But you and I both know the timing of all of this is a little bit suspect with the casinos and all of those things.”
Durpetti said she filed a Freedom of Information request with the city’s Department of Aviation asking for “all of the information and plans related to the project coming into the space” now occupied by Gene’s Bistro.
It came back “so heavily redacted, we couldn’t read it.” Durpetti is disputing the need for the redactions, and the document is now in the hands of the Illinois Attorney General’s office, she said.
“Why are things redacted? Why is there a need to hide something?” she said.
“The lawsuit itself is not about whether or not a casino goes in… This is about trade secrets, trademark violation. It’s about breach of contract, and it’s about misrepresenting everything that you said you were doing in order to get us to help you win this bid as an anchor brand and then, the minute something better came along, you went ahead and pursued that.”
The breach of contract lawsuit filed this week in Cook County Circuit Court accuses SSP America of negotiating with Bally’s to turn the Gene’s Bistro space into a sports bar that includes slot machines.
But that is not the central argument of the restaurant’s lawsuit.
The complaint accuses SSP of using Gene & Georgetti’s “trademarks, trade secrets” and other of “confidential information” — including recipes, ingredients, suppliers and marketing strategies — only to change the menu in a way that destroys Gene & Georgetti’s reputation and brand.
“The concept at Midway has Korean tacos on the menu. Would you say that’s conducive to the brand you know is Gene & Georgetti? That’s what we’re talking about,” Durpetti said.
“My grandfather used to say, you are your name and your reputation. We’ve spent 85 years, three generations building this reputation. SSP in behaving this way puts that reputation at risk. There is not one item on that menu that we create and we served — ever… How is that damage not serious?”
Officials with SSP America could not be reached for comment on the lawsuit.
In a statement released to Crain’s Chicago Business, SSP America dismissed Gene & Georgetti’s legal claims as “without merit.” The statement goes on to say that any decision related to the Gene’s Bistro space are “part of a broader evaluation process” and that “no final tenant has been determined.”
Gene & Georgetti has managed to survive economic pressures posed by the pandemic, rising food prices, city mandates and immigration raids.
The Gene’s Bistro conflict is “a little bit of a David & Goliath tale, but that’s why I’m doing it,” Durpetti said of the lawsuit. “These large concession operators leverage really beloved local restaurants to secure public contracts, and then marginalize them later. I’d like to maybe keep someone from going through what we’re going through.”
