The team at Wolfgang Puck Catering wants to come cook in your kitchen.
The 200-plus person operation is looking to expand beyond the six Dallas-Fort Worth venues where it serves as the exclusive caterer.

The team at Wolfgang Puck Catering demonstrated pickling techniques at Union Station, the company's local headquarters. (Photos: Karen Robinson-Jacobs / DMN)

To help fuel expected fiscal year 2015 growth of more than 15 percent, the company is looking to boost “off premise” gigs, which could be anywhere from an official event space to a family home.

“We’re not just about the six brick and mortar locations,” said Jack Murray, regional director of sales for Wolfgang Puck Catering. “One of the things we’re really focusing on in 2015 is really branching out [to] grow our off-premise business.

“Anyone can hire us to do catering at home. We can do anywhere from 10 to 3,000 people on any given night,” he said.
The catering program for the ubiquitous celebrity chef operates locally out of a 6,000 square foot kitchen on the second floor of Union Station.

Puck, who is based in Los Angeles, visits several times a year, Murray said.

In addition to being the official caterer for the weddings, fund raisers and other events held at Union Station, Wolfgang Puck Catering also is the official exclusive caterer for Reunion Tower, the venues of the AT&T Performing Arts Center, Nasher Sculpture Center, Verizon Theater, and the newest addition, the Perot Museum of Nature and Science.

Murray hosted a group of food writers at the Union Station kitchen Thursday night. The staff demonstrated pickling techniques, which he said are growing in popularity. The chefs served up samples of preserved persimmons, pickled grapes, and piccalilli along with miso glazed ham hocks and edamame.

The catering team served samples of sweet spoon bread souffle.

Two years ago, Murray said, sales were roughly $12 million. “In the last two years it’s grown …to $16 million,” he said.

For fiscal year 2015, which began in October, the company projects a sales increase of between 15 and 20 percent.

Some of the increase is due to the addition of the Perot, which opened in December of 2012. “But the balance is our growth in the region based on our popularity,” Murray added. “In a given year we average about 180,000 people” served.

To expand “off-premise” sales, the company has “dedicated two people in the region to start working on that — forming relationships with venues such as … the Old Red Courthouse, different facilities around town where we’re not necessarily exclusive but certainly have the capability to work.”

If that business takes off as the company hopes, it will hire new chefs to prepare more home-cooked meals.

Photo courtesy of Francesca's

Shares of Houston-based women’s apparel and accessories retailer Francesca’s are up 24 percent this morning after its CEO of two years resigned and a Dallas executive moves into the top job.

Michael W. Barnes on Friday was named chairman, president and CEO of the chain of 538 boutiques.

Barnes left Signet in October saying he wanted to be closer to his family in Dallas. Signet’s U.S. office is based in Ohio. To be sure, Houston to Dallas is an easier commute with fewer snow laden airports along the way.

Earlier this year, Barnes orchestrated the purchase of Irving-based Zale Corp. to Signet, the parent of Kay Jewelers and Jared chains.

Prior to joining Signet, Barnes spent 25 years at Richardson-based Fossil and was president and chief operating officer when he left to become CEO at Signet.

It will be interesting to see what Barnes has planned for Francesca, a boutique that has grown rapidly in the past few years, but is a lot smaller than Signet and Fossil.

Barnes succeeds Neil Davis. Francesca’s also said Friday that it will report third quarter results on Wednesday. It warned that same-store sales are down 6 percent from a year ago.

Honda says it will recall 3 million more vehicles in the U.S. to fix airbags supplied by Takata Corp., according to Bloomberg.

The automaker – Takata’s biggest customer – will add the vehicles in other areas of the U.S. to current recall campaigns that have focused on high-humidity regions.

Five motorists in Honda vehicles have been killed by Takata devices, a growing crisis that is straining a 50-year relationship between Honda and Takata.

Autoliv Inc. will supply Honda with additional airbag inflators within about six months to help the company continue to replace Takata airbags, Bloomberg said.

The automaker’s airbag recalls began in 2008.

(file photo)

2015 Ford Mustang GT

Car and Driver magazine’s “10Best Cars” for 2015 range from the sensible Honda Accord to the sensational Corvette Stingray.

All of the cars on this year’s list cost $80,000 or less, Car and Driver said.

In addition, the cars offer value for their cost, have a “strong mastery” of their particular segments and are “graceful in motion,” the magazine said.

In alphabetical order, the cars – all 2015 models — are:

BMW M235i

Cadillac CTS

Chevrolet Corvette Stingray

Ford Mustang GT

Honda Accord

Mazda3

Mazda6

Porsche Boxster/Cayman

Tesla Model S 60

Volkswagen Golf/GTI

I’ve had the good fortune this year of driving all the cars on the list but the Porsche and Volkswagen (the Volkswagen Group is not great about putting new models into this region’s press fleets).

But I certainly agree with the selection of the rest. In fact, if you want to see just how good modern cars have gotten, go drive any of them.

If I had to select the best of the best, I’d probably choose the Corvette Stingray and Mustang GT. Both all-new cars get smart, thorough redesigns, but retain very much their core muscle-car virtues.

To view the complete list, visit www.caranddriver.com.

Claiming racial discrimination, a group representing African American owned media has sued Dallas-based AT&T Inc. and DirecTV for $10 billion.

The complaint, filed this week in a California federal court, alleges that wholly-African-American-owned media have been shut out of doing business with AT&T and DirecTV, which plan to merge.

AT&T called the allegations “outlandish” and “completely baseless,” and said diversity is a top priority.

The lawsuit states that, together, AT&T and DirecTV spend about $22 billion a year on channel carriage fees and advertising. Of that, less than $3 million goes to 100% African American owned media. It states that many companies that target African American viewers are not actually owned by African Americans.

The suit was filed by the National Association of African American Owned Media, a recently established organization, which represents at least one TV production and distribution company. The company was not named.

AT&T said that its customers can watch many African-American-oriented networks in all of its U-verse markets. And it makes Justice Central, which is 100 percent African American owned, available to more than 95 percent of its subscriber base.

Irving-based La Quinta Holdings Inc. said Mitesh “Mit” Shah, who has been on the board since last year, has been appointed board chairman. 

Shah currently serves as chief executive and senior managing principal of Noble Investment Group. Noble, which Shah founded in 1993,specializes in investments in lodging and hospitality real estate.

Shah also currently serves as a member of the owner and franchise board for Hyatt Hotels Corporation and is a member of the Industry Real Estate Finance Advisory Council of the American Hotel and Lodging Association.

“Mr. Shah has been an extremely valuable member of the board, and we look forward to his leadership as chairman,” Wayne Goldberg, president and chief executive of La Quinta said in a statement. “He has significant expertise in the lodging industry and we are excited to further benefit from his experience and insights.”

William Stein, 52, the previous board chair, resigned last month.

Audi plans to build an electric-powered crossover vehicle in 2017 to compete with Tesla, Automotive News says.

California-based Tesla has emerged as a legitimate competitor to high-end German automakers with its $100,000 Model S sedan and says it will introduce an SUV based on the Model S next year.

Audi, the world’s second largest maker of luxury vehicles, expects to sell 1.7 million vehicles worldwide this year.

The new crossover will be Audi’s first mainstream all-electric vehicle.

The automaker believes that electric cars and other alternative-power vehicles are important because they symbolize cutting-edge technology, Automotive News said.

That is a selling-point with luxury buyers who want to believe that the higher prices they pay for their vehicles are buying better, more technologically advanced vehicles.

Audi’s sales in the U.S. are up 15 percent this year, already surpassing the record 158,061 vehicles sold last year.

“Our growth in the U.S.is bound to continue,” Audi CEO Rupert Stadler told Bloomberg. “We setting our sights on the 200,000 mark and once we’ve reached that, we’ll look at the 300,000 mark at some point.”

New car and truck sales in the Dallas area increased 4.2 percent in October, falling slightly behind the 6 percent rise in sales nationally.

However, new-vehicle sales remain on a healthy pace for 2014 in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, with volume up 5 percent for the year through October, according to The Freeman Metroplex Recap of new-vehicle sales.

“It’s in that range that we were hoping for — somewhere between 5 and 10 percent,” said Lee Chapman, president of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metropolitan New Car Dealers Association. “We’re looking for a strong finish.”

Dealers in some area counties continue to do better than those in neighboring counties – possibly an example of consumers’ shopping new vehicles on the Internet and going where prices are lowest.

New-vehicle sales in Collin County, for example, continue to be sluggish.

Though sales were up a modest 2.4 percent in October in Collin County, they remain flat for the year, according to the Freeman Recap.

Meanwhile in neighboring Dallas and Denton counties, new car and truck sales were up 3.9 percent and 6.1 percent respectively through October.

Tarrant County dealers saw a 5 percent increase in sales in October and are up 8.8 percent for the year, according to the Freeman Recap.

Richardson-based Service King recently passed the 200 mark in the number of collision-repair facilities that it has purchased in 21 states as part of its expansion efforts nationwide.

The company’s most recent acquisition was Kirmac Collision Services in Seattle, a small chain of shops founded 41 years ago.

The purchase was Service King’s first in the Pacific Northwest. The company did not disclose what it paid for Kirmac Collision Services.

“Entering the Pacific Northwest is an exciting step forward for us,” said Jeff McFadden, president of Service King. “Entering our 21^st state is a proud moment for the Service King family.”

Ian McIntosh founded Kirmac Collision Services in British Columbia in 1973 before expanding into Washington state in 2000. Kirmac has 12 collision-repair centers in the area.