History of the Waffle Cabin®

Waffle Cabin® started in 1998 in Boston as “Leo’s Gaufres de Liège” from a pushcart. 

Peter Creyf: “It was called Leo’s Gaufres de Liège because Leo was my tutor back in Belgium in 1996-1997”. 

"Leo shared his know-how and remains a dear friend who I visit every time I go back to Belgium. He’s 74 and still going strong, making waffles because he loves it and he told me he just can’t see himself retiring even though he doesn’t need to. Crazy (perhaps?) – but true! On my last visit, he said “he loves every bit of it as much today as yesterday!”

I worked with Leo making the dough & I worked with him in his retail outlets. I learned all the basics of this dough, retail in general and retail specifically with this product. “It ain’t rocket science, but yet many still get it wrong!”  As I did when we started our pushcart in 1998. I transplanted the info I knew from what Leo told me, yet it wasn’t working!

Why? We’ll because the US and Belgium are different, and this is also still a novelty product in the US. Different markets, different dynamics!

Peter Creyf: “The beginning was not just hard, it was rough !!  We were the pioneers with launching the sugar waffle in the US, and that isn’t always easy. However to also become a settler, one must have staying power. All the good and the bad we went through are now however part of the basics of why, where and how to start a waffle business and be successful. In retrospect, I’m glad we went through these lessons, so that our franchisees don’t have to”.

All the bad (and the good) were great lessons. The result was my idea to start this up in ski resorts. I contacted several, was given an opportunity to showcase our product at a resort, and they loved, loved, loved the product.  So, we were given a test case – like a pop-up one sees nowadays. And the results ware not just encouraging, but great.  I had the feeling after just one week that this product can run a marathon in this niche market. And so we started building a concept, and the predecessor of the Waffle Cabin® was born, named “Waffle Haus” (Since we couldn’t trademark that name, a couple years later, we changed the name to Waffle Cabin® and trademarked it).

We grew the Waffle Cabins® to many resorts in New England, and learned a lot along the way as well, although it was a relatively easy growth – life was good and “quite easy”... Nice !

Once we covered most resorts that are logistically serviceable within a day’s drive (back and forth), the question arose: Do we want to own & run these Waffle Cabins® ourselves, or franchise the concept?

Franchising was the answer, and the Franchise arm was created, we hired a seasoned franchise veteran – George – and off to the races we were again...

If you read up to here, I’m guessing you either have an interest in a franchise, or some other interest in the Waffle Cabin®.  Either way, thank you for reading and I hope I was able to not bore the hell out of you!  If I did, let me know, so that I change this text...