Raynham IHOP reopens nearly three months after kitchen-area fire – Wicked Local Taunton

Charles Winokoor Taunton Gazette Staff Reporter @cwinokoor

RAYNHAM Theres nothing like a fire to speed up a remodeling job in a restaurant.

They planned to remodel in August, but this kind of pushed it up a month or so, said Dawn Souto, who works as a waitress at the IHOP at 235 Route 44.

The restaurant recently reopened after closing for nearly three months due to a fire that broke out May 31 in the kitchen area.

Assistant manager Nicole Rolls said there was a soft opening with shorter hours of operation on Saturday, Aug. 26.

Management since then, she said, has conducted interviews to fill a handful of positions.

The fire was the second fire within a span of a year to damage the building, which before becoming an International House of Pancakes in 2006 had been a Bickford's Family Restaurant.

A fire in August 2016 damaged a rear portion of the IHOP building and led to water and smoke damage. The IHOP reopened days after that fire.

Rolls said the cause of the May 31 overnight fire was a piece of floor-mat carpet that an employee placed too closely to the pilot light of a hot-water heater in the kitchen.

The non-stick rug piece, which typically is placed in front of the restaurant's entrance, ignited. No one at the time was in the building, she said.

The silver lining, Rolls and Souto say, is a newly designed IHOP with a centrally situated, blue-tiled hostess booth; new seating accommodations for customers waiting for a booth; and a washable faux-tile floor taking the place of old carpeting.

Rolls says dining room seating has expanded from 132 to at least 162 seats.

Customer reaction, she says, has been encouraging. "The first thing they notice is, 'Wow, it's been redone,'" Rolls said.

The rest is here:
Raynham IHOP reopens nearly three months after kitchen-area fire - Wicked Local Taunton