Ruth Fertel: The Single Mom Who Built a Steak Empire

Ruth Fertel: The Single Mom Who Built a Steak Empire

Ruth Fertel had no restaurant experience, no business degree, and no money to spare when she mortgaged her house in 1965 to buy a small steakhouse called Chris Steak House on Broad Street in Mid-City New Orleans. She was a divorced single mother of two boys, working as a lab technician at Tulane Medical School, looking for a way to pay for her sons’ college tuition. Within a few years, she had turned that struggling 60-seat restaurant into one of the most successful steakhouse chains in the world. Ruth’s Chris Steak House now operates over 150 locations across the globe, and it all started with one determined woman and a second mortgage.

The Beginning

Ruth was born in Happy Jack, Louisiana, a tiny fishing village in Plaquemines Parish. She was a prodigy—she entered LSU at 15, graduated at 19 with a degree in chemistry and physics, and was the first woman to earn a degree in those subjects from the university. After her divorce, she scanned the classified ads looking for a business to buy and found Chris Steak House listed for $18,000. Friends told her she was crazy. She bought it anyway, using the equity in her home as collateral. On her first night, she served 35 customers. She figured out the rest as she went.

Building the Brand

Ruth’s genius was her focus on quality. She served only USDA Prime beef—the top two percent of all beef produced in the country—sizzling in butter on a 500-degree plate. The steaks arrived at the table still crackling. The sides were simple. The service was warm and professional. Word spread fast in New Orleans, a city that takes its food as seriously as any place on earth. When a kitchen fire destroyed the original Broad Street location in 1975, Ruth moved to a new spot on Broad Street but was contractually prohibited from using the Chris Steak House name at a different address. Her solution was to add her own name to the front: Ruth’s Chris Steak House.

The Empire

Ruth began franchising in the 1970s and 1980s, expanding first across the South and then nationwide. She maintained rigorous quality standards at every location—the same USDA Prime cuts, the same 500-degree plate, the same sizzle. By the time she sold the company in 1999, Ruth’s Chris had become the largest fine-dining steakhouse chain in the United States. Ruth personally oversaw the business until her death in 2002 at the age of 75, having built a global brand from a single restaurant purchased on a gamble.

A New Orleans Original

Ruth Fertel’s story is a New Orleans story in the best sense—a story about food, grit, and the refusal to accept limitations. She took a risk that everyone told her was foolish, bet on her own ability to learn, and built something that outlasted her. The original Ruth’s Chris on Broad Street is still open, still sizzling, and still a pilgrimage site for steak lovers from around the world. Not bad for a single mom from Happy Jack.