The family that owns Zankou Chicken, the Southern California restaurant chain that’s a favorite of critics and is mentioned in a song by Beck, is embroiled in an intense feud that has hindered the company’s efforts to expand,
the
Los Angeles Times
reported.
The company, which features Middle Eastern-inspired food and takes its name from a river in Armenia, was founded in Beirut in 1962 by Vartkes and Markrid Iskenderian, an Armenian couple, the article said. They eventually fled war-torn Lebanon and opened their first U.S. restaurant in Hollywood in 1984. There are now ten Zankou now restaurants in the region.
Rita Iskenderian and her four sons run eight of the restaurants. In 2003 her husband, Mardiros Iskenderian, the son of Zankou’s founders, fatally shot his mother and sister and then killed himself, the
LA Times
article noted.
Mardiros had ambitious plans to expand the business internationally, but his parents balked at the idea, according to the report. On his own, he opened four Zankou branches in Southern California.
The business’ patriarch, Vartkes, died in 1992. For several years, Mardiros and other members of the family fought over various aspects of the business, including the rights to the Zankou name. The fight became increasingly bitter over the years.
Mardiros shot his sister and mother in their home after a loud argument on Jan. 14, 2003, and then killed himself with the same handgun.
His sister’s sons “inherited their mother’s share of the first Zankou in Hollywood, which they continue to own with her sister, Haygan Iskenderian,” the
LA Times
article said. They also opened a branch in Montebello.
Rita Iskenderian’s family owns the Zankou restaurants that her husband opened plus four more branches. Rita “lost a court battle to take sole control of the trademark,” the report noted. She owns the company’s website, which does not list the Hollywood and Montebello locations. (Source:
Los Angeles Times,
March 18, 2010.)
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