History, charm lure Wild Bill's owners to Cheney

What gets someone into a business can be anyone's guess.

For the owners of the iconic Wild Bill's Long Bar in Cheney it was simply time to stop shedding all the blood, sweat and tears for someone else.

After years of working for others, "It was time to try it ourselves," bar co-owner Greg Hubbard said. Along with business partner Charlie Witte, the Spokane duo have operated Bill's since earlier this year.

Both, Witte, a Spokane native, and Hubbard, originally from Coos Bay, Ore. have spent their lives in the hospitality business.

"I grew up working at a golf course every summer, that was kind of the first step," Witte said.

He later graduated from the University of Idaho and moved to Chicago where he would work in downtown restaurants. Witte moved back to Spokane and worked at bars and restaurants, including the Satellite Diner.

Hubbard had similar working experiences and ended up at the Satellite as well.

"I saw the way our bosses did things down at the Satellite," Witte said. Their business practices inspired him. And who could argue the success of the Satellite, an establishment with 18 years of operation.

Part of the desire to own a place of their own came from a dedication to where they worked, Witte explained. "We just put so much into everything we did down there - special events, promoting our own personal shifts, being there on and off the clock for the bar."

It was all for someone else, Witte said, so he and Hubbard decided, "It would feel so much better if we were doing this for ourselves, it would feel so much more rewarding."

As for Cheney, "We actually looked at buying this over a year and a half ago," Hubbard said. Both Bill's, and Goofy's (now the Asylum), were owned by Steve Baldwin of Spokane.

The uncertainty of moving to a college town from downtown Spokane was one of the factors that kept them from pursuing the venture earlier. "That wasn't our expertise," Hubbard said. "But we did it anyway."

What swayed the pair?

"The first time we looked at it he (Baldwin) was trying to sell both bars," Witte said. "It was just a lot to take on, we just didn't see how that was possible."

But Baldwin got back with Hubbard and Witte to let them know he had sold Goofy's and that they should revisit the idea.

The two came out to Bills' on a Saturday night to observe the place and the next day they called Baldwin to say he had a deal. "The next thing you know we owned a bar," Witte said with somewhat of a shocked tone in his voice.

Several months into the venture, in unison, both Hubbard and Witte said things are going "Great," so far.

"The university has been awesome, the students have been pleasant," Witte said. "The locals have been beyond supportive and are excited for us."

In their location on Cheney's unofficial "bar block," with four establishments within a block of each other, Wild Bills' niche is its longevity. It's the oldest bar in Cheney.

"Unlike next door (at The Asylum) we didn't want to reinvent the wheel, we just wanted to take what we had and make it better, more current," Witte said.

Witte said it was a combination of history, charm - but most of all the customers - that makes their bar special.

"I think we have a real good mix of local Cheney community and we developed a relationship with the university which is important as well," Witte said. Locals populate the bar early and later the crowd turns younger with more of a college crowd.

The bar currently has a limited food menu, but plans to expand. Along with Bill's, they bought the corner building from Baldwin, a place that had been penciled in for sometime as a pizza parlor. It has a kitchen. "We'll call that phase two," Witte said.

Like any new business, the bar continues to be a work-in-progress. "We're just trying to figure it out every day," Witte said.

Paul Delaney can be reached at [email protected].