07/02/2026
And what a wild ride it has been š make sure yāall come out and celebrate with us when we open back up on the 6th!
āI came to Florence to get my life together.
When I was growing up, I had wild parents, wild everybody, so I kind of went wild myself. I did great in early school, but by the time I got to high school I was more concerned with playing football, and I got introduced to all kinds of other stuff, and then I didnāt even care about football by the endājust made some poor choices. After high school, I went to Northeastern Technical College in Cheraw for three or four years and never got a two-year degree. I just didnāt do well in school. It felt like I was in a caged environment, and I couldnāt wait until it was over.
So, I floundered around making poor decision after poor decision, and at this point, I didnāt have a lot of support at home, so life was pretty rough. I was making tough situations worse. I moved to Florence literally with a couple trash bags full of clothes and nothing else. I was 22 years old, had nothing, and after only ten days away from home, I found out my dad had passed away. I felt like I had just left him and the last thing I said to him was the worst thing you could ever say to somebody.
So new city, bad situation at home. But if all you know is stuff like thatā¦I didnāt know these character traits I had at the timeāpersistence, resilience, and grit would come to be so important in my life, but God gave me those in spades. And then Warren Snell gave me an opportunity waiting tables at Fatz CafĆ©.
But that wasnāt my first venture into food service. Growing up, my grandfather had a seafood market and restaurant in Sunset Beach, North Carolina, and if I wanted to see him, I had to go to the beach because he wasnāt leaving.
I fell in love with seafood and restaurants, and I would spend my summers at the beach with him. And it wasnāt like I got to live at the beach for the summer to hang out and fish. I spent my summers in the seafood market in the morning, icing everything down, then Iād take a short break before I was back at it to bus tables at the restaurant all night long.
And I loved it.
I still donāt know if hospitality is for me, but I was exposed to hard work and being able to take ownership of your own thing. My grandfather didnāt answer to anybody, you know? He was my guy, Papa Joe, and he would stand in the same spot, concrete floor all day, and Iād watch him just filet flounder, clean them all day long, whistling like there was nothing wrong in the world. And at the time I didnāt know it, but he probably did that with a crazy mortgage, seven employees probably called out, and everything was probably burning down around him. But youād never know it because he just whistled and cut fish all day, and if I was really good, Iād even get a dirty joke from him.
And that was all I ever wanted in life.
Iād sling key lime pies and cocktail sauce and head shrimpāIām the fastest two-handed shrimp header around. Iām not sure itās anybody elseās dream, but it was my dream. I did it every summer and I loved it.
I loved the industry. I might not have fit into normal society, and Iāve always felt like that. But I did fit in a restaurant. Because a restaurant isnāt normalānot whatsoever. So, Iām 22, working for Fatz CafĆ©, waiting tables, and I meet the woman that would later become my wife, start having kids, and I realized I couldnāt make it on waiting tables alone. I worked for another grandpa who owned Hardee Mercantile, it was like Walmart on wheels. And then I landed a corporate job in Florence, and I went from making $300 a week to almost six figures in my first year. This was life changing. I had health insurance for the first time, my kids had dental insurance, and hell, life was good.
And I was miserable.
And I remember sitting in a cubicle, another cage, someone telling me at the end of the month that the company was 12% away from quota and that Iād need to grind it out. For me, it felt how school felt. You could have paid me six figures to sit in school, and I still donāt think Iād have been happy doing it. But there, I reconnected with Steve Toniolo, whose family owns Stefanoās. We met when we were 19 and both working at Captain Daveās Dockside in Surfside. We became close and were eating lunch one day and the shrimp we had just sucked. And Steve remembered my grandpaās place at Sunset Beach and proposed we start bringing that seafood to Florence to sell on the side of the road, which sounded like the best idea Iād ever heard of in my life.
So Tubbās Shrimp and Fish was born out of a bad experience at a little restaurant over lunch. And weād work our day jobs and then drive up Friday night to my grandpaās to fill the back of my truck with diver scallops and the most beautiful local North Carolina flounder and shrimp. We named it Tubbās after Tubbās Inlet right behind grandpaās place at Sunset Beach.
I was having the time of my life. We were selling out every weekend, and the first bit of money we made, we took ourselves out to a really nice dinner to celebrate. It was the best hobby Iāve ever had, and I had no idea what it would become. We grew this business from parking lot to an old gas station on Second Loop Road and we did all the work ourselves. And when I went to my wife and told her I wanted to quit my corporate job and do this full time, she supported me and told me to rock and roll and follow this dream. Steve and I both quit our jobs and put everything we had into Tubbās.
And Florence supported us.
Over time, we started using Tubb's as an incubator for other concepts, which is how King Jefe was born. We started doing Taco Tuesdays at Tubbās and Steve had this dream of a little taco shop, so we were able to build on the success of Tubbās and transition to opening King Jefe downtown.
This is my favorite restaurant, not because I own it and eat here four times a week. Creating Tubbās, building out that restaurant was a slug fest doing it ourselves and bootstrapping everything. I even pawned a lot of my stuff to get Tubbās open. But the Main Street program had these unreal financing opportunities at the time to support new businesses downtown because there wasnāt a lot going on down here yet. Twenty years prior, the only reason Iād come downtown was to get my hair cut at Swoleās Barbershop.
I was able to pick out hand-painted Talavera tiles and choose the kind of edge we wanted on the bar top. And it was FUN. I didnāt realize Iād even like that part. We even commissioned original artwork for the walls. How cool is that? So King Jefe took off like a hot star, and I think downtown was craving something unique like this. All glory to God and to Steve, if it werenāt for them, Iād be unhappy working for someone else because I never believed in myself enough to ever do anything like this.
We continued testing concepts, not all of which worked out. But a lot of opportunities presented themselves through taking a chance. Iād be lying if I said itās great and fun all the time, because the reality is there are a lot of hard days. Just recently, ten minutes after getting really frustrated, I was in the dining room pre-busing a table and I was whistling apparently. And some guy stopped me and said, āhey man, you must really love your job.ā And I replied that it was pretty hard that day, but I appreciated him saying that.
I had three grandpas growing up, all three of them owned their own businesses and were their own men. Two of them died shortly after closing their businesses and didnāt seem to get to enjoy much living. They created opportunities for their families. And then my third grandpa, a titan of industry, retired at 50 and played golf and traveledāhad an amazing life. And somewhere in between those two things is where I hope Iāll land.
My attachment to Sunset beach has dwindled over time. My grandpa sold everything he had before he passed, but my goal is to get back there and take it back over. I donāt need mansions; I just need a little bit of peace and security. I find peace in the restaurants and hopefully will find a little security along the way.
God willing, one day, Iāll be back at Sunset Beach in the same spot, hopefully whistling, cutting fish, and telling my own grandson the dirtiest jokes."
- Kyle Hardee, Owner of King Jefe, Downcountry Grill , and Tubb's Shrimp & Fish Co.
