De Beyer and Mathis
One Fat Frog loves feel-good stories as much as we love restaurants. This time we are sharing both. It’s the story of a restaurant entrepreneur who decided to do what it takes to help out a valued employee even if it means saying goodbye to their 17-year-old restaurant business.
Brittany Mathis is a 19-year-old waitress working at the family-owned Kaiserhof Restaurant and Wunderbar, an authentic German restaurant located in Montgomery, Texas. It was recently discovered that Mathis has a brain tumor, though the seriousness of the tumor is unknown. Mathis has no health insurance and has already built up unmanageable medical bills from her MRIs, CAT scans and other tests. To date she hasn’t even had the proper tests to see if the tumor is benign or malignant because she doesn’t have the money. That’s when the restaurant owners decided to step in.
“I can’t just be standing by and doing nothing,” said restaurant owner Michael De Beyer. “I have to try something because it’s not right.” His solution was to sell the popular restaurant and use part of the proceeds to pay for Mathis’ past and future medical bills.
De Beyer believes that the German restaurant is worth at least $2 million. He tried to sell the restaurant once before but ended up turning down an offer of $1.3 million. Once the restaurant is sold and Mathis is taken care of, De Beyer plans to use whatever’s left to retire and spend more time with his wife and children.
Brittany Mathis and her family have a special connection with the restaurant. Both her sister and mother also work there. Tumor scares are particularly difficult for the family. Brittany’s father, John Mathis, died of an undetected brain tumor in 2000.
One Fat Frog commends Mr. De Beyer for his generosity and wishes Brittany a speedy recovery. If you’re in the Montgomery area, stop by Kaiserhof Restaurant and Wunderbar and say thank you to the owner for doing the right thing.