Hap’s WOWs Its Customers with Fast Service, Quality Food
 Hap’s, the long, narrow burger and hot dog restaurant on Main Street not much wider than an elevator, is the big winner of this year’s Best of Rowan contest.
Hap’s won the Best Customer Service, Best Lunch, Best Sandwich, Best Hot Dog, and Best Hamburger categories.
That’s five categories in the restaurant field and Hap’s doesn’t even offer its customers a place to sit. Parking is also limited.
What Hap’s does do, according to Greg Culp, owner, is get to know its customers and offer quality food. The only short cut Hap’s takes is in assembly. Greg can make 14 hot dogs in a minute.
Before Hap’s opens to customers at 10 a.m. six days a week, the three-man crew has spent two hours in prep work.
Each day, they hand pat 140 pounds of fresh ground beef into burgers and then pre-cook them for 45 minutes. Then, they’re ready for the grill. They also cut and chop 100 pounds of onions each day and make the chili from scratch.
“What we do is not easy,” says Greg. “During lunch time, it’s wide open and a whole lot of fun.”
 Greg has seen his customer line stretch a half block to both corners of the 100 block of North Main Street. During a $1 hot dog special on the Fourth of July, Hap’s had a customer line five across backed up half a block.
Hap’s reputation is far flung. Two years ago, it made The State magazine’s list of “75 Things North Carolineans Should Do.” Greg often runs into Hap’s customers on his vacations. Scuba diving in the Bahamas recently, 20 miles out in the ocean, he had someone yell at him: “How about a hot dog?”
He has two customers who drive to Hap’s from Mooresville three days a week and several guys from Statesville who drive over each week.
He shipped frozen Hap’s hot dogs to Will Blanton, a fighter pilot in the Navy, at his brothers’ request. The brothers met in Thailand for the Christmas holiday and Will loved his Hap’s dogs, his brothers reported back.
Greg says there are a lot of reasons for Hap’s appeal.
“It’s owner operated,” he says. “People come in and they are going to see me. I’m working hard, and I’m going to make a go of it. People appreciate that.”
Greg emphasizes that he doesn’t consider himself the boss. “Hap’s requires three employees and I’m one of them,” he says. “I’ve got the greatest help of any restaurant in Salisbury.”
 Vicki Carter has been calling out orders for 20 years and right-hand man Jamie Gobbel has worked at Hap’s for four years. He’s been Greg’s best friend since they were 2. “Jamie thought this would be a pie job,” says Greg. “After one lunch shift, he said it was hardest he had ever worked.”
Hap’s has been a mainstay in the 8.5-foot wide building on Main Street for 23 years. That’s 3.5 million hot dogs ago, the way Greg figures it. Hap’s carries the name of the founder, Hap Alexander, who sold the business to Greg 15 years ago.
Greg recalls riding his bicycle from his home in Spencer to the library in Salisbury to work on a book report when he was 14. Someone at the library told him about a new hot dog joint in town and Greg went over for a hot dog. He also asked Hap for a job. Hap told him he was too young to work, but hired him anyway. When Greg graduated high school, Hap asked him to work full time. Four years later, at the age of 22, Greg was the owner.
“I did not change a thing,” he says and he doesn’t plan to. He and Hap remain close friends, talk every day, and think about a franchise. “We can’t decide if it can be duplicated,” Greg says.
Hap grew up in Salisbury but his family moved to Wrightsville Beach when he went to Western Carolina University. Hap had summer jobs at Ward’s Grill at the beach. When he finished college, he went into banking, then became a paving estimator in Salisbury. “One day he was walking down the sidewalk and saw this building about the size of Ward’s Grill. He called his wife and boss, told them he was quitting his job, and he opened Hap’s.”
Since leaving Salisbury 15 years ago, he has owned a seafood restaurant, Sears Landing, at Topsail Beach.
In addition to taking pride in the food, the Hap’s employees say it is important to get to know your customers. Vickie timed Greg one day, and he got the orders right for 14 customers straight, without them saying a word.
“Our service is real quick for people downtown going to pay their water bill or going to court,” Greg says. “You’re in and out in a minute or two.
“We’re fast food, but we’re different from fast food.”
Story and photos by Linda Bailey
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