We’ve written before on the fine art of running a business with one’s significant other (and not wanting to kill them by the end of the day!). Tim Lamce and Robin Burke, the couple behind Fishtown’s Emo’s Pizza, were willing to illustrate their personal take on the challenge of balancing the professional with the personal: lots of vivacity and humor.
Lamce moved to Philadelphia from Albania about ten years ago. He quickly befriended his across-the-street neighbors: Burke and her five sons. Along with a romance, a business plan developed, and Emo’s Pizza was born in August 2002.
If Lamce brought the entrepreneurial spirit, Burke brought the local expertise. “I was born and raised here,” she explained, motioning to block after block of brick Fishtown rowhouses, “52 years here.”
Burke’s lifelong relationship with the locals shows. Emo’s is located at the corners of Norris and Memphis Streets, a busy intersection in the neighborhood. She sits on one of the milk crates strategically placed outside the shop, where she and Lamce typically sit and chat with friends when business is slow. Within an hour, she fussed over a new baby already clad in Phillies gear, examined a customer’s haircut, and exchanged pleasantries with the landlord, later recounting all of the properties the family owns. Within a few minutes it’s clear; Burke knows Fishtown and its residents inside and out.
When Lamce joins Burke on the milk crates, he’s equally congenial, although she’s often the one to coax stories from him. Taking full credit for teaching him English when he moved here, she encouraged him to talk about the process.
He smiled, “I saw a sign in a store window that said ‘open.’ That’s the first word in English that I recognized.” The word was fitting. Burke and Lamce work long hours at the store. After some bad experiences with employees in their first three years of operation, they’ve entirely stopped using outside help; he stays in the shop from open to close each day.
“There’s definitely stress with that,” she said candidly of their long hours.
“It’s only stressful once she shows up,” Lamce joked.
Lamce shared that one of his favorite thing about running the shop was “The people you meet. There are many opinions and many stories. You learn everything this way.” Their friendliness shows; the majority of the people who stop in to buy pizza, cheese steaks, and the infamous $1 ice cream cones, are greeted by first name. Most drivers who stop at the intersection roll down their car windows for a friendly salutation.
That’s not to say that it's all sunshine at Emo's. Burke shared about having an argument with Lamce in the shop, but having to pause it when customers come in: “We can’t do that in front of people.”
As quick witted as always, she explained that, even if it wasn’t for their relationship, she couldn’t be fired. “I can cook ten cheese steaks at a time. He couldn’t find anyone else who can do that.”
Lamce laughed and waved at another familiar pedestrian passing by the shop: “We share the love this way. It’s a strange way, but we share the love.”