Fairhaven restaurant planning to move into bigger space

Written by Dave Gallagher | The Bellingham Herald | March 29, 2011

This will be in Wednesday’s retail column, but here’s a sneak-peak:

After six years in a small space, Tom Traibush is ready to give customers and employees of Fairhaven Pizza Company a little more elbow room.

Traibush is planning to move the pizza place into the former Flats Tapas Bar space at 1307 11th St., near Skylark’s café. Plans for the move have begun and he expects to be in the new space by June.

The move will allow Fairhaven Pizza to have more customer seating. The area also has more pedestrian traffic, so once in the new space Fairhaven Pizza will begin serving lunch, which includes selling the pizza by the slice.
To date Fairhaven Pizza has primarily served as a take-out place for customers, particularly those on their way to Trek Video for a pizza and movie night.

“We never had enough seating to do much else,” Traibush said.

Before starting Fairhaven Pizza, Traibush worked as a commercial fisherman for 25 years. He still makes the trip up to Alaska each fall for the prawn season and plans on incorporating that seafood into his business plan. He’s pondering ideas such as having a guest chef come in to make dishes with the prawns on Mondays, when the pizza place is typically closed.

The bigger space and the increased seating will also give the company a chance to hire a few more employees.

Although he’s excited about the new changes, he hopes it doesn’t impact the loyal neighborhood customer base that’s helped the business thrive.

“The take-out portion will remain an important part of our business,” Traibush said. “The good friendships I’ve made in this neighborhood and the great staff makes this enjoyable.”

For details about the company, call 360-756-7561.