Harborside hangout celebrates 'Sweet 16'

OCEAN CITY TODAY/NANCY POWELL Harborside Bar & Grill on the commercial harbor in West Ocean City is celebrating its 16th anniversary this year. (April 3, 2009) Take a solid staff, mix in one great drink, add a generous portion of laid-back attitude and what you have is 16 years of sweet success for Chris Wall and Lloyd Whitehead.

This year marks the 16th anniversary of their Harborside Bar & Grill on Harbor Road in West Ocean City, where, as its patrons know, is the place "to get crushed."

That would be referring to the bar's notable "Orange Crush," the Harborside's signature cocktail, which epitomizes

the approach Wall and Whitehead have taken in building the business into the popular destination it now is — create a good product, market it well and business will follow. Many restaurants boast of their fine dining and fancy atmospheres, but what put Harborside on the map, the pair say, was a good staff and a mixture of Smirnoff Orange Vodka, triple

Harborside Bar and Grille opened in 1993, replacing the Stumblin' Inn. Business was good and a staff of 20 people in peak season could manage the customers. The invention of the Orange Crush was coincidental, Wall said. He misread the weather reports, and kept the outdoor bar open a week longer than usual.

Chris Wall The tail end of summer business can be slow, so Wall and Whitehead were outside keeping the bartender company. They started mixing things and thus the Orange Crush was born.

The pair say the Orange Crush is now imitated in bars as far south as Florida and as far north as New York. In one week, Harborside can go through as many as 9,000 oranges.

The restaurant now takes on as many as 70 employees during the summer. The only major changes in the establishment have been the renovation of the kitchen in 2001 and an additional parking lot on Harbor Road.

While the Orange Crush does draw business, Wall said the real reason people come to Harborside is the employees.

"Lloyd and I are fortunate to have the staff we do," Wall said. "We have the right people."

L. Whitehead Wall said the staff is constantly coming up with new ideas for food and drinks. They bounce ideas off each other and the next thing you know there is a new special.

"I love it here, I love everything about it," bartender Brian Ziegler said. "You see new faces all of the time."

There are plenty of familiar faces as well, including Lynn and Larry Bollinger, who have been coming to Harborside every Tuesday for three years from Elkton, Md.

Tuesdays are their only day off, so they make the two-hour drive to their beach house in West Ocean City for a "mental health day."

"This is our favorite stop," Larry Bollinger said. "We really enjoy the commercial harbor, watching the boats go through."

Harborside's Web site, www.ocharborside. com, describes the restaurant as "rustic." Nailed up on the wall a flipflop reads, "Need shoes? We can help!"

Harborside is named for its view of the commercial fishing harbor, which is overlooked by the outside bar. The inside bar has a pool table and a host of TV screens.

"Being here on the water is great, it has a wonderful ambiance," Ziegler said.

Meanwhile, the Harborside continues to grow and bustle with activity, while its friends, supporters and new customers "get crushed."