🍔🧈A Legacy Well-Done: Solly’s Grille Owner Prepares to Pass the Spatula
GLENDALE, WI (CBS 58) -- After nearly 90 years of butter-burger history — Solly’s Grille is for sale. But its legendary legacy isn’t going anywhere. When it comes to Milwaukee classics, few things are more iconic than a Solly’s butter burger — always topped with love… and plenty of butter.
The Glendale landmark has been sizzling since 1936, but after about nine decades, that legacy is entering a new chapter. CBS 58's Alex Corradetti spoke with longtime owner Glenn Fieber.
“Solly's has been around since 1936. My stepfather Solly started it way back when somewhere around August. Solly's has always been a small café, and I think on Martin Luther King Drive they had 16 seats there. Now we have 24 here at the counter and two seats at the table. So, it's always been a small neighborhood place. We get up close and personal with the people, with the customers, and try to make friends with everyone who comes into the restaurant. They come back for years and years and years, and they just love how we are still here," said Fieber.
And over those years, Solly’s has attracted more than a few famous faces. “Bob Uecker came in quite a few times and we got to know each other pretty well,” Fieber recalled. “So, I'd be cooking over there on the grill, facing that way, and Bob would come through the front door and yell in his beautiful baseball voice, ‘Hey Glenn, how ya doing?’ And I just kept cooking, and I said, ‘Please sit down Bob — and keep it down.’ We’d just go back and forth.”
The friendship became part of Solly’s lore. “One day I came up to him and I asked him, ‘Bob, would you mind if I put your brass plate on here with your name?’ And he turned around and said, ‘You know it’s about bleep time you did that," Fieber said with a smile.
Through the decades, Solly's has drawn everyone from Liam Neeson to Packers greats Gilbert Brown and Santana Dotson. Glenn even cooked with some actors from the Wizard of Oz and made a malt for Leslie Nielsen from airplane. “We never know who is going to come in. We love them all,” he said.
Still, his favorite part of the business has always been the people sitting right across the counter. “Yeah, it's a beautiful job. I guess the best thing I like about the restaurant business is talking with people and meeting new people from around the world and finding out where they come from. One of the first things I ask people when they're sitting here is, ‘Are you from the neighborhood?’ and that just starts conversation. Nine times out of ten they're from wherever — Japan, Australia, Oklahoma — all over the world.”
For 40 years, Fieber has carried his family’s legacy — one built by his stepfather and mother. “I'm very proud that my family and that I have continued my stepfather’s legacy and continued my mother's legacy because she took it over after Solly did and ran it very, very well. So I put my 40 years in, and it's emotional seeing my end of this restaurant come to fruition.”
Now, at 76, he’s ready to slow down. “My wife and I decided it's time for us to retire. We have a small window of life, and we would like to enjoy it as best as we possibly can… with our friends and do tripping around America. I love to fish — hopefully there is a boat in this future for me. And I can do some fishing with my son and daughters, and we are just going to enjoy the rest of our lives," explained Fieber.
He admits the decision is emotional. “It's not here yet, as everyone knows we are up for sale, and so I think when the final day comes at some point in time… we are going to keep the restaurant open all the way through this thing.”
Fieber says he’s being selective. “We're really trying to be picky and choosy if I can say that. We really want someone in here that would continue this atmosphere but maybe step it up a level. Maybe another one somewhere else around town — and who knows, beer and wine? I don't know what someone else would do, but we want them to be local if we can and friends of ours maybe. Who knows who will want to step on in and continue on the legacy?”
That legacy, of course, is built on butter. “Well, Solly started the butter burger. Solly liked butter on his burgers and then he decided to open up a little café and he just ran with it. It was the most popular restaurant in the city of Milwaukee and stayed that way through my mother and then me for 40 years. We have had good fortune and the media — we thank the media — you guys followed us and treated us tremendously well. We kept the food very clean, kept the food quality-minded. I really tell people who are coming in here who look at the restaurant that it would be very dangerous to change what we have done for so many years.”
And yes, the signature ingredient still matters. “We do a real big dollop of butter — like a real mean, heavy tablespoon of butter. Softened butter so that when you get it, it’s already starting to melt around the cheeseburgers and hamburgers. There is a certain way to serve Solly's burgers, and hopefully we train and educate the people who would come in after me to do the same thing. None of these customers want to see Solly's change, and we are going to try and do that.”
Running a restaurant this long hasn’t always been easy. “We got through some tough times. We got through the 2008 financial problems, and we got through COVID — and COVID was the worst that I’ve ever been through,” Fieber said. “We actually had to let our staff go; there were only two people plus me running the restaurant during COVID. We had plastic shields every two seats — it looked like you were eating in a telephone booth — and people didn’t really go for that.”
Fieber reflected while thinking about how far they’ve come. “It bled into what is going on now — everyone is talking to each other and associating with each other, having a great time.”
Glenn credits his current team. “We have the best staff right now that I think actually, I have ever had. We have a group of people here that are turning this restaurant into a great thing. It takes a while to get a good staff, train them, educate them, and train them my way — the social way and actually talking to people. I think one of the worst problems in America today is the non-social atmosphere that is going around the country. We want to keep the social atmosphere here and allow people who come in here to talk to us, and we’ll talk to them and make them feel honored to be there, make them feel respected, and show them what hospitality was like years ago and still is here at Solly’s.”
That hospitality has kept generations coming back. Barry Ploessl from La Crosse said, “We veered out of our way to eat here because I want to take my staff to the best burgers that I know of — the home of the original butter burger. It’s just such a cool vibe and the burgers are absolutely wonderful. I love the counter and the atmosphere. When I was a kid, to get a shake or malt in the metal mixer and share that with my sister or my mother — it was really something. Good memories.”
Clem Stoeckl has been coming since the 1990s. “I’ve been coming here since the ’90s and enjoying the wonderful food they serve here and the ambiance — the counters, everything wide open, the grill right there. The real funny part is looking at the counter where you see 50 pounds of butter just getting to room temperature; you know it’s gotta be a good place. Hopefully the new owners will keep it just like it is — you don’t want to ruin a good thing.”
And 91-year-old Jim Mathius has been a customer since 1943. “My name is Jim Matthias, and I've been coming here since I was 9 years old,” he said. “It’s like eating in your own dining room. I like the people and how they prepare their food. It’s a nice place to eat and I like the fact that all my five children like to eat here. Even though I drive all the way from Menomonee Falls, it’s worth it. When my son comes from California, the first thing he says is, ‘We’re going to Solly’s.’”
Through it all, Fieber says the restaurant has been more than a business — it’s been family. “Every day is different. My first step into this restaurant is usually, ‘Hey Glenn, there’s a phone call for you.’ Then the day starts. It could be anything — there’s a flood in the parking lot, something broke in the basement, or the malt machine is broken. We mix our own malts — we hand-dip them; we don’t have an ice-cream machine that plops ice cream in. We actually dip into the ice-cream container, fill the steel can, mix it, and serve it to you in the steel can. Not many restaurants do that anymore.”
He’s grateful for the recognition Solly’s has earned along the way. “Thank the James Beard Foundation. I had no idea I was ever going to win the James Beard Award. One day I opened up my email and it said, ‘You are the winner of the James Beard Award.’ I called my daughter in California and said, ‘Would you please check this out to see if this is for real?’ She called me back in about five minutes and said, ‘Dad, you've just won the James Beard Award.’ It was for being an old classic restaurant — you had to run it for at least 40 years. We are in our 89th year at this time, so we qualified well for this one.”
For Fieber, the key to longevity has always been simple: “Do things right food-wise and social-wise and be strong if you're running Solly’s or if you're working here at Solly’s. Get through tough times and you're going to make it.”
He doesn’t know exactly when the spatula will change hands. "Whether that happens next week or a year from now, I really can’t say right now.”
As Glenn looks ahead, he’s thankful for everyone who has sat at the counter, shared a malt, or made a memory. “I'd say thank you for a wonderful ride and thanks for being our friends and hope to see you again.”
Solly’s Grille remains open at 4629 N. Port Washington Road in Glendale.