Clark banks on banquets
By Jason Jacks
If you are not yet familiar with this festive man, then you might be surprised to know that you may have already been to one of his parties.Clark, who recently moved to Springfield, is president and the brainchild behind Waterford Receptions, which includes in its fold the Waterford banquet hall near Fair Oaks Mall and the future Waterford at Springfield.
His Fair Oaks facility, now in its fifth year, hosts about 160 wedding receptions each year, the most in the state, Clark estimated. And when it opens in mid-2006, his 44,000-square-foot Waterford at Springfield—on Commerce Street across from the Courtyard by Marriott in central Springfield—will be the second largest catering hall in Fairfax County, second only to the Ritz-Carlton in Tysons Corner.
But how hard could it be to open a banquet facility? You get your hands on a big building. Gut it. Then put out some fake flower bouquets and nice china.
Right?
Not even close.
"It took 17 years to make this happen," Clark explained.
Originally from Connecticut, Clark, 53, caught the politics bug while attending Lafayette College in Easton, Pa. He spent his summers interning in Washington, D.C., before eventually moving to the area to work on Capitol Hill.
However, not unlike countless other wide-eyed political hopefuls looking to soar to the heights of a Newt Gingrich or Ted Kennedy, Clark made a career detour. In 1974, he started a popular tour group company in Washington, D.C., which eventually spread to New York City and San Francisco.
A decade later, after he sold his share of the business to his partners, the idea for a banquet hall surfaced after he and his wife at the time, Joan Clark—who now works for Lee District Supervisor Dana Kauffman—struggled to find a hall for a New Year's Eve party they were hosting.
With this dearth of local banquet options fresh in his mind, Clark eventually acquired the lease for the Jerry's Dodge building in Springfield with plans to open a hall there. But he had to scrap the idea after the Lee District supervisor at the time, Joseph Alexander, came out strongly against a banquet facility at that site.
Clark tried again in 1987 with a piece of property he had lined up on Telegraph Road in Alexandria near the Capital Beltway. However, the historic "Black Monday" stock market crash of that year put his banquet hall idea back "to bed" for another 11 years, he said.
It was not until the late 1990s, while Clark was working with the transportation advocacy arm of the Washington Airports Task Force, that he was able to make important connections and persuade about two dozen investors, including local developer John "Til" Hazel, to buy into his vision.
In July 2000, with $700,000 in advanced bookings already in place, Clark opened Waterford at Fair Oaks in an abandoned movie theater.
"From one end of the building to the other, it smelled like popcorn," he remembered.
In the future, Clark envisions opening nine Waterford banquet halls throughout the southeastern United States, he said, including the facility in Springfield.
"Location-wise, it's perfect," he said about his Commerce Street building near the Springfield interchange, which used to house a Toys 'R Us store and a mattress discounter.
"We'll get some customers from as far away as Fredericksburg," he said.
Clark said he is not surprised by what he calls a recent "wave of development" in Springfield, which includes a Marriott hotel and proposed large mixed-use development called Midtown Springfield.
He thinks other companies had been shying away from the area because of the gridlock that the Springfield Interchange Improvement Project brings with it. But, as work there wraps up, Clark predicted "many" more companies will follow the Waterford's lead.
But why wait that long, he was asked.
"Some of us had to see the value of Springfield before the Mixing Bowl was done," he said.