A building in Victoria’s Burnside-George neighbourhood is now pretty in pink, all thanks to a local restauranteur expanding his business for the fifth time.
“We tried to keep it a secret. Slowly, it’s been ebbing its way out into the community,” said Petr Prusa, the man behind Floyd’s Diner.
It’s a pentamerous milestone for Prusa, who took his love for food up a notch with the new Floyd’s, which opened a day after Valentine’s Day on Thursday, Feb. 15.
“This is the fifth location,” he said. “It’s great.”
The diner, open seven days a week from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., is located at the Vic Hotel at 123 Gorge Rd. E.
Prusa secured the space in late 2023, but it wasn’t ‘Floydalized’ until the new year. “Because nobody works during Christmas,” he laughed. “It took us about a month and a half to get it open.”
‘Funky and fun’
The push to operate another Floyd’s, already with locations in Brentwood Bay, James Bay, Langford and Royal Oak, came naturally.
And with its iconic pink paint job, of course.
“The hotel group that is here approached us. I guess the guys who own the hotels ate at Floyd’s, and they loved the concept. The hotel is now called the Vic Hotel, and they did a huge reno on it. It’s funky and fun,” said Prusa.
“They thought we’d be a great fit and came and looked at the space and thought the same thing,” he told CHEK News Sunday.
READ PREVIOUS: Floyd’s Diner opens in Brentwood Bay
The exterior of each Floyd’s location is plastered in the pop of colour known as ‘Heartbreak Pink,’ according to Prusa, as customers inside are served breakfast and lunch in “a fun and friendly, family-oriented atmosphere for all to enjoy.”
Floyd’s has been around since 2004.
Prusa says his staff makes it all worth it, with plans to further expand his business already in the works. Only this venture will be unlike the others.
“It’s the fun. It’s the staff who are just being themselves and inviting them into their own space, really,” said Prusa. “Our staff love to go from location to location, and we’re slowly building a community from within.”
Now, he hopes to turn to tilling.
“We want to build a farm where we are going to grow things that we can supply Floyd’s with, but we’re also going to turn it into a health and wellness retreat for our staff. I like the peace and the quiet and the farming,” he said.
“Right now, we’re looking at a place in Cowichan.”
But growing a business this much does come with its reservations.
A Dalhousie University report released last fall found a majority of Canadians were dining out less as a result of higher food prices.
“I think sometimes, during this kind of time in the world, I’m a little trepidatious, just because God only knows what’s going to happen in the future with world economics,” Prusa told CHEK News in a previous interview.
“It’s a little scary, but at the same time, if we don’t move forward, then what’s going to happen? We won’t go anywhere, right? Let’s just keep going.”
So he’s thanking customers for their continued patronage.
“Without them, we couldn’t do it.”
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Ethan Morneau
