Coppermill restaurant returns to Cache Valley

After a little over two year hiatus, the Coppermill restaurant has come back. But this time it will be in a new location. Its old location was in The Emporium building in downtown Logan for nearly 30 years but closed in 2014. On Monday, the Logan Steakhouse will be officially rebranded as The Coppermill.

“Ultimately, it came down to feedback from the community,” says Trevor Booth, Director of Marketing for Wasatch Premier Hospitality, the company that owns the Logan Steakhouse, Elements restaurant and Marriott Springhill Suites. “People would ask, ‘Why don’t you do a salad bar?’ Okay, we do a salad bar and it’s really successful.

“Basically, it’s the menu from 2004, and that was the busiest year at the Coppermill. We thought, let’s take our busiest year and duplicate the menu. We did keep some of the items from the Steakhouse menu, but other than that it’s pretty much the 2004 Coppermill menu.”

Over the past five or six months, Booth says original Coppermill menu items were being added to the Logan Steakhouse menu. And customers responded well and kept asking for more.

“Lo and behold we (introduce) the the Western Mill, the Cordon Blue, the Chicken Louie, things like that, and they started going like crazy,” exclaims Booth. “It was getting busier and busier here. The Steakhouse is doing alright, it wasn’t overly busy, but it’s not like it was so slow that we were going to close it.

“We just started adding those menu items and people kept asking ‘What about this one? What about that one?’”

The Coppermill was started by Trevor’s father, John, in partnership with Shirl “Mac” McKay in the mid-80’s. John Booth is involved again as the restaurant’s CEO, and Trevor says he’s not the only familiar name getting involved with the restaurant again.

“We have some of our original cooks from the Coppermill back here cooking,” Booth explains. “Brian Bastion, he was one of our main guys at Coppermill. He stayed with us for nearly 30 years. He’s running the kitchen back there, making sure everything comes out how it’s supposed to.”

Trevor says the Booth family, and Wasatch Premier Hospitality, are banking on the name recognition and familiarity of the Coppermill menu. It’s not that the Logan Steakhouse wasn’t working out, Booth says, it’s that the Coppermill had so much heritage in the community that couldn’t be ignored.

“It just resonates with Cache Valley residents. The younger crowd, like teenager age and younger, probably doesn’t recognize it,” says Booth. “But anybody over 20 recognizes the Coppermill. At some point in their life they were there for a wedding event, a dinner with their family, or whatever. So we just felt like ‘Let’s bring it back, let’s do it.’”

The restaurant will still be able to host wedding events, company parties, receptions, or large luncheons with The Grove.

“The Grove is not as big as the original Coppermill by any means but it can hold about 150 people,” Booth explains. “The Grove will still be there and we’ll have the Coppermill banquet menus over there, like the classic Chicken Paprika, Au Gratin potatoes, things like that.”

The timing of the rebranding is also interesting considering Logan City’s recent announcement that it would be tearing down the old Emporium building where the Coppermill used be housed. Booth says he was shocked to hear the announcement and hopes the city does something to preserve the character and history of that space.

“I’ll be sad to see it go, I’m not going to lie. I grew up there,” Booth continues. “I was four when they opened it. I was in and out of there my whole life. I worked there. It is what it is at this point, but I think it will be interesting to see what they do with it.”

In the meantime, Booth says he is excited about the future of an old restaurant in a new space.

“Give it a shot. It will be fun, I’m excited about it. I’ve always felt we should have done it that way.”

Booth says there will be special offerings throughout the next month and giveaways on local radio stations to encourage people to once again become familiar with one of Cache Valley’s classic eateries.

Free News Delivery by Email

Would you like to have the day's news stories delivered right to your inbox every evening? Enter your email below to start!