SgtTigger
03-23-2008, 10:54 PM
Al Copeland Founder of Popeye's Fried Chicken Dies at 64.
This was someone from my home town that made himself famous. He started out right here in St. Bernard Parish. I lived right down the street from where he started out.
At christmas time he had more decorations than anyone and 1,000 of people would come to see every night. I would go with my family every year to see the lights. He was Jennings Osborne before there was an Osborne lights....... As I got older I took my nieces to see the lights every year.......
He is someone who will be missed.....
Here is a story from www.WWLTV.com
Copeland a self-made millionaire with a penchant for the flamboyant
WWLTV.com
Ask someone in south Louisiana to define the term "self-made man," and there's a good chance they'll include the story of restaurateur Al Copeland in their answer.
The New Orleans native built his fortune on fried chicken, but went on to grow a restaurant empire that would include other restaurants, hotels and business ventures.
Born in 1944, Copeland was a Louisiana millionaire with a penchant for the flamboyant, and a flair for the flashy, with speedboats and race cars carrying him through a life in the fast line.
He even celebrated Christmas bigger than everyone else, decorating his Metairie mansion every year with a display that drew huge crowds to his home and prompted lawsuits from his neighbors.
Always the survivor, Al Copeland prevailed, explaining that it was a big heart, and not big ego, that motivated him to decorate even more every year.
“I love to see people come by and see it. I love to see the kids and just look in the kids' eyes and see they just marvel and just look at all the lights, they just get blown away,” Copeland said in a 1997 WWL-TV interview.
“People from all walks of life come and they enjoy it and that's the real thing that I get a kick out of. It's sort of like giving a little something back. I like doing that."
Born the youngest of three children in a poor family, who lived for a time in public housing, Al Copeland dropped out of high school and worked at a Schwegmann's supermarket before a gift from his brothers helped him start a donut shop in Arabi.
In 1972, he opened the precursor to Popeye’s, first called "Chicken on the Run." It didn't fly until he reopened it under the Popeye's name with a much spicier recipe that would later become his bread and butter.
Business picked up, and by the end of the next decade, Copeland owned more than 800 Popeye’s restaurants and a franchising empire that touched nearly every state and 8 foreign countries.
Copeland tried to keep his business growing, by acquiring another well-known chicken chain in the 1980s.
The merger with Church’s Fried Chicken created the country's number two fast food chicken company but later plunged Copeland into bankruptcy court.
He lost Popeye's, but kept his spice company and a deal to provide products to Popeye's restaurants nationwide.
Copeland and his family also opened other, more upscale restaurants across the country, including Copeland’s restaurants, employing more than 2,000 people.
Someone as well-known as Al Copeland was also hard-pressed to avoid controversy.
In the 1990s, he and novelist Anne Rice tangled over the look of one of his restaurants on St. Charles Avenue.
In another incident the chicken king brawled with Robert Guidry, a millionaire casino mogul who was also his longtime rival, allegedly getting into a fistfight at a downtown steakhouse.
Copeland's four marriages also kept people talking, especially when one of his divorces became part of a courtroom scandal which toppled a sitting Jefferson Parish judge.
Controversies aside, Copeland always stayed true to his rags to riches persona but also said that his success in the restaurant business wasn't about making a fortune, but making a future for his family.
“To me today, it's not about money for me anymore, now it's about building a business, making a family-run business so my kids can run it, and keep it going. That's the idea."
This was someone from my home town that made himself famous. He started out right here in St. Bernard Parish. I lived right down the street from where he started out.
At christmas time he had more decorations than anyone and 1,000 of people would come to see every night. I would go with my family every year to see the lights. He was Jennings Osborne before there was an Osborne lights....... As I got older I took my nieces to see the lights every year.......
He is someone who will be missed.....
Here is a story from www.WWLTV.com
Copeland a self-made millionaire with a penchant for the flamboyant
WWLTV.com
Ask someone in south Louisiana to define the term "self-made man," and there's a good chance they'll include the story of restaurateur Al Copeland in their answer.
The New Orleans native built his fortune on fried chicken, but went on to grow a restaurant empire that would include other restaurants, hotels and business ventures.
Born in 1944, Copeland was a Louisiana millionaire with a penchant for the flamboyant, and a flair for the flashy, with speedboats and race cars carrying him through a life in the fast line.
He even celebrated Christmas bigger than everyone else, decorating his Metairie mansion every year with a display that drew huge crowds to his home and prompted lawsuits from his neighbors.
Always the survivor, Al Copeland prevailed, explaining that it was a big heart, and not big ego, that motivated him to decorate even more every year.
“I love to see people come by and see it. I love to see the kids and just look in the kids' eyes and see they just marvel and just look at all the lights, they just get blown away,” Copeland said in a 1997 WWL-TV interview.
“People from all walks of life come and they enjoy it and that's the real thing that I get a kick out of. It's sort of like giving a little something back. I like doing that."
Born the youngest of three children in a poor family, who lived for a time in public housing, Al Copeland dropped out of high school and worked at a Schwegmann's supermarket before a gift from his brothers helped him start a donut shop in Arabi.
In 1972, he opened the precursor to Popeye’s, first called "Chicken on the Run." It didn't fly until he reopened it under the Popeye's name with a much spicier recipe that would later become his bread and butter.
Business picked up, and by the end of the next decade, Copeland owned more than 800 Popeye’s restaurants and a franchising empire that touched nearly every state and 8 foreign countries.
Copeland tried to keep his business growing, by acquiring another well-known chicken chain in the 1980s.
The merger with Church’s Fried Chicken created the country's number two fast food chicken company but later plunged Copeland into bankruptcy court.
He lost Popeye's, but kept his spice company and a deal to provide products to Popeye's restaurants nationwide.
Copeland and his family also opened other, more upscale restaurants across the country, including Copeland’s restaurants, employing more than 2,000 people.
Someone as well-known as Al Copeland was also hard-pressed to avoid controversy.
In the 1990s, he and novelist Anne Rice tangled over the look of one of his restaurants on St. Charles Avenue.
In another incident the chicken king brawled with Robert Guidry, a millionaire casino mogul who was also his longtime rival, allegedly getting into a fistfight at a downtown steakhouse.
Copeland's four marriages also kept people talking, especially when one of his divorces became part of a courtroom scandal which toppled a sitting Jefferson Parish judge.
Controversies aside, Copeland always stayed true to his rags to riches persona but also said that his success in the restaurant business wasn't about making a fortune, but making a future for his family.
“To me today, it's not about money for me anymore, now it's about building a business, making a family-run business so my kids can run it, and keep it going. That's the idea."