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Coventry, Ohio —
Food has returned to the site of the recently demolished Young’s Hotel in Coventry.
The site, located on the corner of Carnegie Avenue and Manchester Road, now has “Sassy Dog,” a mobile hot dog stand that sets up shop there Monday through Friday.
Sassy Dog is the creation of Diane Berube-Morrison. She has been involved in the food business since the late 1970s when she ran Berube’s Custard Stand on East Avenue in Kenmore. She left it in 1986, but returned in 2005 for one year before the owner of the property had financial problems.
Sassy Dog was created one day while Berube-Morrison was driving home from her job at Tiffany’s Bakery in Fairlawn.
“All of a sudden it hit me that I wanted to own a hot dog cart,” she said.
The name resulted when she was sitting at the dinner table talking about what to call it.
“My granddaughter was sitting there with us and suddenly said, ‘Grandma, quit being so sassy.’ And that was when I decided that we would call it Sassy Dog.”
Originally, she wanted to operate the stand from her pontoon boat that is moored at Dusty’s Landing in the Portage Lakes.
“I wanted to sell hot dogs on the lakes to boaters,” she said.
“I got permission to do this from the Division of Parks, but eventually decided against it.”
Berube-Morrison said she decided against it because she would be alone on the board and if something came up, such as a storm, she could find herself in peril.
So the idea of a waterborne Sassy Dog was put on the back burner. Instead, she decided to attach a trailer hitch to her yellow Volkswagen and pull the cart around.
This all started three years ago.
“My first location was on Barber Road across from Fred Martin Motors,” she said. “Then I decided to lease my current site on Manchester Road from the city of Akron.”
That turned out to be a great move as it increased Berube-Morrison’s visibility.
“I don’t have a website yet, so all my marketing is done through world of mouth,” she added.
Berube-Morrison does advertise on her yellow Beetle and Power Graphics of Norton developed many of the graphics.
“Originally the ‘sassy eyes’ where brown like mine, but it really didn’t stand out so we switched to blue,” she said.
Food has returned to the site of the recently demolished Young’s Hotel in Coventry.
The site, located on the corner of Carnegie Avenue and Manchester Road, now has “Sassy Dog,” a mobile hot dog stand that sets up shop there Monday through Friday.
Sassy Dog is the creation of Diane Berube-Morrison. She has been involved in the food business since the late 1970s when she ran Berube’s Custard Stand on East Avenue in Kenmore. She left it in 1986, but returned in 2005 for one year before the owner of the property had financial problems.
Sassy Dog was created one day while Berube-Morrison was driving home from her job at Tiffany’s Bakery in Fairlawn.
“All of a sudden it hit me that I wanted to own a hot dog cart,” she said.
The name resulted when she was sitting at the dinner table talking about what to call it.
“My granddaughter was sitting there with us and suddenly said, ‘Grandma, quit being so sassy.’ And that was when I decided that we would call it Sassy Dog.”
Originally, she wanted to operate the stand from her pontoon boat that is moored at Dusty’s Landing in the Portage Lakes.
“I wanted to sell hot dogs on the lakes to boaters,” she said.
“I got permission to do this from the Division of Parks, but eventually decided against it.”
Berube-Morrison said she decided against it because she would be alone on the board and if something came up, such as a storm, she could find herself in peril.
So the idea of a waterborne Sassy Dog was put on the back burner. Instead, she decided to attach a trailer hitch to her yellow Volkswagen and pull the cart around.
This all started three years ago.
“My first location was on Barber Road across from Fred Martin Motors,” she said. “Then I decided to lease my current site on Manchester Road from the city of Akron.”
That turned out to be a great move as it increased Berube-Morrison’s visibility.
“I don’t have a website yet, so all my marketing is done through world of mouth,” she added.
Berube-Morrison does advertise on her yellow Beetle and Power Graphics of Norton developed many of the graphics.
“Originally the ‘sassy eyes’ where brown like mine, but it really didn’t stand out so we switched to blue,” she said.
The Beetle is an attention-getter and Berube-Morrison also has two other yellow vehicles, neither a Beetle.
“Only one is marked up as Sassy Dog, though,” she said. “My goal is to eventually replace them with yellow Volkswagens.”
Berube-Morrison gets an assist from her son, Drew.
Kenmore resident Linda Michael was drawn in by the yellow Beetle.
“I was going out of town for the Fourth of July and decided that I wanted a hot dog on a grill, so I stopped and got one,” she said. After the first bite she said, “It tastes very good.”
Right behind her was a regular customer, Gary Sunderland of Hartville, who works down the street at a local steel plant.
“I stop almost everyday and get two coney dogs and some pop for lunch,” Sunderland said. “I have tried everything on the menu. All of it is good and I have never had anything bad. But the coney dogs are my favorite.”
Berube-Morrison said her best-seller is the coney, though she offers other types of dogs, from the regular grilled type to the super “Chicago Dog.”
“I can’t put everything on it that they do in Chicago so I call mine the ‘Akron Dog,’” she said with a laugh.
In between there are also kraut, cheese, fire and hillbilly slaw hot dogs. Rounding out the menu are mild and hot sausage.
“I use Sugardale hot dogs which are rated the best hot dogs around,” she said. “My sausage is from DiRusso’s.”
Side orders include chips, “sassy sweets” and cold drinks.
“This is like a drive thru,” Morrison said. “People pull up, place their order, and then find someplace, like the lake, to relax and eat. Normally on a good day I sell around 100 hot dogs and 20 sausage sandwiches.”
Besides setting up during the week, Berube-Morrison also caters parties, festivals, car shows and other events.
“On Monday nights I set up at the car outing down by the waterfront in Cuyahoga Falls,” she said. “Usually I am booked up for the weekends. Because of the mild winter this year I was able to open then and just dressed nice and warm. About the only problem I really have is the weather.”
Where does she hope to go with Sassy Dog?
“I hope someday to be able to franchise it,” Morrison said. “My eventually goal is to someday become the Rachael Ray of hot dogs.”
For more information about Sassy Dog, call 330-607-3121 or email yellowbug13@yahoo.com.
