St. Thomas Grand Opening – May 2006 From left: James Lee (President Kings Buffet Group) Mayor Dave Rock (Mayor of Central Elgin) Mr. & Mrs. King Leung Lee (James’ parents) Mayor Jeff Kohler (Mayor of St. Thomas) Mayor Jim Wilson (Mayor of Malahide) Steven Lee (Corporate Chef) Kenh Hoang (Regional Manager) Eladio Polanco (Manager)

At age eleven, James Lee and his family immigrated from China in 1979. Their first stop was Ottawa, Ontario. Like most new Canadians at the time, the Lee family had brought very little from their simple countryside life other than a tremendous desire to work and a family dream of a better life. His parents and two sisters immediately found work in the hotel and restaurant industry while James and his brother Steven entered the Canadian school system. By age fourteen, James and his older brother had both found part time jobs in Chinese restaurants.

Through hard work and careful investment of their incomes, the family began creating their own Canadian dream. After leaving school, James began full time work as a server while his brother apprenticed in the preparation and presentation of many Chinese and Canadian dishes. Both quickly rose through the ranks of those less ambitious and took on more and more responsibility in management.

Following his first taste of ownership in a Chinese/Canadian buffet concept out West, James operated his own twenty-four-seat buffet restaurant in Orillia, Ontario. Based on that modest success, James started to research various markets in which to open a larger scale enterprise. While Orillia, at the time, did not offer a suitable real estate opportunity, the nearby community of Midland did.

In February of 1997, James opened Kings Buffet in Midland, a 128-seat restaurant that was the first of what has become a very successful, province-wide chain of outlets. Within eight months, Huntsville opened followed by Barrie, Orillia and then Sudbury. Since then Kings Buffet Group continued to open other outlets in Orangeville, North Bay, London, Stratford, Brantford, Guelph, St. Thomas and Kitchener. Corporate plans call for expansion to continue at the rate of two to three new outlets a year.

Philosophy

The Kings Buffet concept offers a wide variety of Chinese as well as Canadian dishes, which are competitively priced and served in an attractive environment by professionally trained staff. Kings Buffet provides a predominantly self-serve dining concept with both quantity and quality of popular foods in an attractive atmosphere. Additionally, both take-out and local home delivery services are available.

Critical to its success is management’s keen focus and teamwork to maintain extremely high customer service and consistent attention to food, outlet and service detail.

Since its initial Midland launch in 1997 Kings Buffet has created hundred’s of new jobs province-wide and has promoted dedicated and talented staff to increasing levels of responsibility and income.

Kings Buffet, at both the local and head office levels strives to return a portion of their profits back into their communities. Be it a simple donation of Complimentary Gift Certificates for a local event’s door-prize or over twenty thousand dollars to help realize the success of a major community event, Kings Buffet is committed to pursue and support events and programs that clearly benefit the communities in which they do business.

Their customers who, in return have honoured them with many Critic’s Choice Awards have recognized Kings Buffet’s high standards.

Kings Buffet looks forward to continuing its expansion throughout Ontario, and beyond. This growth can only be achieved by every Kings Buffet person’s commitment to the high standards that it has set for itself as well as the new goals it strives to achieve.

Mission Statement

Kings Buffet’s goal is to offer all consumers a superior dining experience through quality food selection, presentation, atmosphere and professional yet friendly service.

To achieve this goal the company strives to support its franchisees, management and employees in meeting or exceeding its own high standards, which provide both personal and financial rewards and incentive.