Bill Handwerker—grandson of the Nathan’s Famous frankfurter restaurant founder—was not handed life on a bun. He spent youthful summers working at the famed restaurant just like any other employee—setting up for the lunch rush, mopping floors and washing dishes.
“My father and grandfather believed that the only way to really know a business was to learn it from the ground up and actually experience it,” Bill says.
After a character-building, summer-grilling adolescence, Bill followed in his brother’s footsteps to Ithaca College.