Mocha House to ban smoking

Concern about secondhand smoke has led to a prohibition on smoking.
By DON SHILLING
VINDICATOR BUSINESS EDITOR
WARREN -- The owners of the Mocha House are prepared to lose some customers as they go smoke free.
"We can absorb the losses," said Bill Axiotis, one of the owners of the downtown restaurant and coffeehouse. "But we think we will attract new customers as well."
Mocha House announced Tuesday that it will prohibit smoking starting April 3.
The restaurant is taking an unusual step, said Mark Glasper, a spokesman for the Ohio Restaurant Association. Most restaurants that have gone smoke free have been forced to take that action by local regulations, he said.
The family members who own the Mocha House are acting on their own because they are worried about the effects of secondhand smoke on themselves and their employees, said Axiotis, who quit smoking about 10 years ago.
"We don't want to offend anyone. But if people are just coming here to smoke, well, we're more than that," he said.
He said the family is proud of its lineup of beverages, food and desserts and thinks its 14-year-old business has a good enough reputation to set limits on smoking.
The restaurant previously installed "smoke eating" machines, but they haven't been able to keep the smoke down well enough, he said.
What happened in Boardman
The Mocha House in Boardman went smoke-free in 2003 and lost some business at first, he said. Later, however, business returned to normal levels, he said.
The family waited longer to ban smoking in its original location because the restaurant had a longer history of allowing smoking and a stronger relationship with its customers, he said. The Warren location opened in 1992, while the Boardman store opened in 1999.
Late last year, Jim Paxos, a cousin of Axiotis', bought the Boardman restaurant from the other family members.
Axiotis said the family also was waiting to see if Ohio would ban smoking in restaurants. Momentum for such a ban is building, but family members didn't want to wait any longer, he said.
Glasper said a coalition of health-related organizations is trying to place a ban on the statewide ballot in November. The proposal by Smoke Free Ohio would ban smoking inside all public establishments.
The restaurant association is proposing that exemptions be included for bars and for restaurants that have smoking areas separated by a wall from the rest of the dining area.
Glasper said the restaurant association contends that a statewide ban is better than a patchwork system of local regulations. The current system is unfair because smoking can be prohibited at one restaurant but allowed at another one across the street, he said.
shilling@vindy.com