Trader Vic’s at the Beverly Hilton

OPEN: 1955–2007

LOCATION: 9876 Wilshire Boulevard Beverly Hills, CA 90210

ORIGINAL PHONE: CR 4-7777

CUISINE: Polynesian

DESIGN: Welton Becket and Associates

BUILDING STYLE: Tiki

CURRENTLY: Trader Vic’s Mai Tai Lounge (a smaller version of the original restaurant)

IN 1934, A YOUNG ENTREPRENEUR NAMED VICTOR J. BERGERON OPENED A SALOON NAMED HINKY DINKS IN OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA. After taking trips to Cuba and Hawaii, Bergeron returned with new ideas and recipes for drinks, and added the tropical flavors of daiquiris and planter’s punch to the Hinky Dinks menu. In 1937, he visited Don the Beachcomber (see page 117) in Hollywood and decided to turn his Hinky Dinks into a Polynesian restaurant, with tropical drinks and a Chinese-flavored menu. Bergeron’s wife suggested that he also change the name of the restaurant to reflect the new menu and drinks. Trader Vic’s came to mind, since her husband loved to barter and make deals.

After his success in the East Bay, Bergeron opened the first franchised Trader Vic’s in Seattle in 1940. Locations in Hawaii and San Francisco followed, and Trader Vic’s began to evolve into a chain of what would become fourteen franchised restaurants. In 1955, Bergeron’s fourth location was installed in the brand-new Beverly Hilton Hotel, under the name The Traders. The restaurant was officially renamed a few years later to reflect its parent company, Trader Vic’s.

The Trader Vic’s chain was well-received in the 1950s, which were flooded with movies and music about the faraway islands of the South Seas, Polynesia, and Hawaii. From Here to Eternity and Blue Hawaii were playing in movie theaters, and South Pacific was running on Broadway. Tiki bars and restaurants were all the rage, with rum drinks galore.

The food at Trader Vic’s was largely fantasy, with no real basis in Chinese or island traditions—such as crab rangoon, a mixture of crabmeat and cream cheese stuffed into a wonton and then deep-fried. The menu included twenty different seafood dishes, all cooked in a specially built oven, as well as suckling pig. Oyster appetizers were also abundant, including Oysters San Juan, Oysters Casino, and the traditional Oysters Florentine.

The entrance to Trader Vic’s, 1996.

Bergeron introduced green peppercorns, morel mushrooms, and kiwi fruit to Los Angeles cuisine. He also helped popularize snow peas and salmon caviar, and pioneered the contemporary use of wood-burning ovens in restaurants. The entire dining experience at Trader Vic’s was a show, from the tiki god glasses, to the flaming drinks, to the wall hangings of tribal masks and flat-bottomed riggers hanging from the ceiling.

The Beverly Hilton Trader Vic’s became a favorite watering hole for Dean Martin, Walter Pidgeon, and Ronald Reagan—before and after he was elected to be governor of California. The hotel served as a sort of western White House for John F. Kennedy and his administration. Miramax often used Trader Vic’s as a gathering spot, and the Weinstein Company held parties there to celebrate the Golden Globes.

In the 1960s, as many as twenty-five Trader Vic’s locations were in operation worldwide, some under other names like Trader Vic’s Island Bar and Grill, Señor Pico, and the Mai Tai Lounge. In 1972, United Airlines hired Bergeron to design and implement the food and beverage service aboard the Boeing 747s and McDonnell Douglas DC-10s, from the mainland to Hawaii and back. Bergeron signed on with the pay of a bank president, along with free travel passes and publicity for his restaurants. A month later, he delivered his plan, which proposed new ideas like fruit-flavored salad dressings, hand-shaken drinks with fresh ingredients, and a rack of lamb dish. At the time, United Airlines had also partnered with Western International Hotels, several of which housed a Trader Vic’s in their lobbies.

When Bergeron died in 1984, his chain was worth an estimated $50 million a year. However, during the 1980s and ’90s, the chain began to shrink as a result of poor location choice and declining popularity. In 2007, Beny Alagem, the new owner of the Beverly Hilton Trader Vic’s, shut the restaurant’s doors and opened Trader Vic’s Mai Tai Lounge, a poolside bar at the hotel that serves cocktails and a few of the appetizers from the original menu.

Today, there are three Trader Vic’s locations left in the United States, as well as three in Europe, eight in the Middle East, and three in East Asia.

The tiki-themed Trader Vic’s, 1962.