Hot dogs, get your hot dogs at Hot Daugs

Matthew Day

Staff

June 2, 2025

MANITOWOC – At Hot Daugs, with vinyl records spinning, a Ms. Pac-Man arcade game in the corner and a menu with prices topping out at $7.25, one may wonder: what year is it again? 

The restaurant, however, opened relatively recently, as Co-owners Brad and Amber Daugs said they’ve been serving – as the tagline says – “frankly the best” hot dogs since mid-April. 

Hot Daugs features 10 signature dogs with 25 different fixings available, and what Amber said is a strong “’80s-meets-’50s” aesthetic. 

This concept, the co-owners said, made for a “hot” start to the restaurant, with a line of customers out the front door. 

“We sold more in a week than we anticipated selling in a month,” Brad said. 

Having only advertised via organic Facebook posts, Amber said the enthusiasm was “really wild,” noting some of the earliest visitors had traveled from Chilton, Elkhart Lake and Green Bay. 

“It was great – the first three weeks were excellent,” she said. “And then (Brad) had a stroke.” 

Brad, 46, said the medical incident came without warning the Sunday night before what would’ve been Hot Daugs’ fourth week open. 

One minute, he said, he was doing laundry, the next he was on the floor, then on a stretcher and ultimately in an ICU. 

The restaurant did not open that week, Brad said, as he remained in the hospital for several days of testing. 

The diagnosis he received, he said, was an ischemic lacunar infarction. 

Brad said though the incident was “very scary,” the main side effect of the stroke has been fatigue, which “just wipes me out.”

As a result, the married co-owners said they cautiously decided to reopen Hot Daugs the following week, albeit with limited hours – 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday – while Brad recovers. 

Amber said they also hired two employees to lighten Brad’s workload, thereby limiting his stress and minimizing the risk of another incident. 

“We obviously are being very mindful of what it is he needs while operating a business – and living life,” she said. 

Brad said his health is what’s most important, and he’s grateful to have not been more severely affected.  

All the same, he said it was still unfortunate the restaurant had a break in its early momentum – “I don’t think being closed for a week helped.” 

However, the couple said Hot Daugs’ customers have been heartwarmingly supportive throughout, including the building’s landlord offering to waive a month of their rent. 

“It’s really sweet how much people really do care,” Amber – who is also CEO/founder of nonprofit community food center Grow It Forward – said. 

On some level, she said they recognize all new businesses face struggles and went into this venture prepared to become a resilient restaurant. 

“We want to make sure this exists long into the future,” Amber said. 

Setting up shop 

Brad said he and Amber – who both grew up in Manitowoc and first met as teenagers – have long discussed co-entrepreneurship. 

“Since she and I have been together, we’ve always talked about different ideas for opening a restaurant or opening a business,” he said, “so it’s been a dream of ours for more than 20 years.” 

Though the two did run a microgreens business – Little Sprouts Farm – together for several years, Brad said that venture primarily operated as a community-supported agriculture (CSA) subscription, and they had never had a brick-and-mortar establishment. 

Opening a restaurant together felt like a natural choice, he said, as both he and Amber had extensive experience in the industry, from kitchen jobs to management. 

A hot dog joint made sense for several reasons, Brad said, foremost being his own enjoyment of the classic fare. 

Hot dogs, he said, also allow for visible assembly, which customers can appreciate. 

“People can see that you’re following the health practices, you’re wearing gloves, your facility is clean and the quality of your ingredients (is high),” Brad said. “It’s not like you send (an order) to a room somewhere in the back, and you just see somebody through a little window and you have no idea what’s going on in there.” 

Further, he said with a fun food like hot dogs, he and Amber would be able to enhance the atmosphere with their interests – vinyl records (on the turntable and a rack for sale), classic videogames and pop art – as brightly as they wanted. 

Finally, Brad said, there is the significance of his German surname. 

“When I was younger, I was sensitive about my name,” he said, “but (with the restaurant), it’s kind of a taking ownership or a reclaiming of it, because some people in my family don’t like to be ‘Daugs’ – they have different ways of pronouncing it. But this way, I was able to reclaim it and just take ownership of it.” 

No matter which cuisine they’d chosen, the couple said they knew how they would divide their would-be restaurant’s duties. 

Amber said through her work with Grow It Forward and more, she’s the more adept of the two regarding customer service, marketing, “all of the ordering, software and IT.” 

Brad said he self-deprecatingly summarizes the distribution as “she does all the management; I put hot dogs on a bun (and) do dishes.” 

Beyond their responsibilities, the co-owners also said they knew the building at 316 N. 8th St. would be the perfect space for what they had in mind. 

They said the narrow, unassuming building – with about 340 square feet inside (about 500 including the rear courtyard) and an occupancy of 20 (including the courtyard) – in downtown Manitowoc had throughout the decades been a hamburger restaurant, a tattoo parlor and a coffee shop. 

“I’ve been looking at this place go up for sale, go up for rent, (then) go up for sale (again) for the better half of the last 15 years, knowing every time that we weren’t quite ready,” Amber said. 

She said it was only after a reluctantly accepted financial gift, following a terrible accident last summer, that they were able to rent and renovate the building. 

“In July (2024), my board president of Grow It Forward, the nonprofit that I run and founded, was in a terrible motorcycle accident with his wife… they were hit by a vehicle head-on,” Amber said. “They were riding on separate motorcycles. The motorcycles were totaled, and I remember getting a text message from him saying, ‘I’m in the hospital, I need help… We need to raise money.’” 

The victims of the crash – Jason and Tina Prigge, long-time contributors to the Manitowoc community – had been self-employed, she said, and now faced permanent disabilities. 

“I launched this fundraiser for them, and in a week, we raised more than $200,000 for Jason and Tina,” Amber said. “They were able to get a new house out of that, that was built specifically for them, for ADA compliance, with no stairs, direct entry into the house (and) direct entry into the shower.” 

While scanning the local real estate market for a suitable home for the Prigges, she said she happened to see that 316 N. 8th St. was once again for rent. 

For all the help she had provided with the fundraiser and Prigges’ recovery, Amber said, Jason offered her “a small financial gift.” 

“He said, ‘Go do something nice for yourself,’ because he knows I just work, work, work with Grow It Forward,” she said. “I’m sure he meant something like go(ing) for a massage. But I ended up showing him (the building) and said, ‘Hey, this place is up for rent… How about if I start the hot dog shop that Brad and I have been thinking of?’” 

With Jason – even amid his family’s hardship – finding a way to support others, Amber and Brad said they were able to pursue their long-held dream. 

From more than a decade of working with the community, Amber said she was fortunate to also have the support of the City of Manitowoc, economic development nonprofit Progress Lakeshore and local insurance specialists, accountants, electricians and more. 

“All of our contractors were local – people she already had relationships with,” Brad said. 

It was important to them, Amber said, “to do things as close to home as possible.” 

Following months of extensive preparation and renovation, and with Amber creating a logo of a hot dog character backed with a vinyl record, by April 2025, the co-owners said they were finally ready to make Hot Daugs happen. 

“You really only live one life,” Amber said. “Dreams aren’t something you should leave on your pillow at night.” 

On the menu 

Though a hot dog restaurant had been attempted in Manitowoc previously, Brad said he and Amber were confident they could succeed in a smaller space, akin to a climate-controlled hot dog stand. 

“The other restaurant that was in Manitowoc had a dining room that could seat 75 people – I just don’t think there are 75 people who are going to want a hot dog (at once),” he said. “We thought, ‘If you do it smaller, and you keep your overhead low, then it can be successful.’” 

Their goal, Brad said, was to create a place “similar to a Chicago hot dog restaurant.” 

“We wanted it to feel urban,” he said. “We do a lot of specialty dogs, and those are tied into our musical and video game interests.” 

Brad said the specialty dogs have names like 8 Bit Bite, Autobahn, Barnstormer, Radio Star, Konami Code and Headbanger, with Golden Coin Tater Tots available as a side. 

Customers, he said, can choose between one of two different types of franks and can add (or subtract) from an array of fixings, including classic condiments, as well as less common toppings like bacon, pickled jalapeños, Asian peanut sauce or avocado ranch. 

Brad said as much as possible, the menu is built on local products. 

“We get our buns from Bakery on State (in Manitowoc), and they make our poppy seed buns specially for us,” he said. “We (have to) get our Vienna beef (franks) from Chicago. But the natural casing wieners come from a place called Misfits Homegrown that’s local, and then they’re processed at Brillion Butcher Shop, which is also local.” 

Brad said the top three sellers so far have been the Chicago Daug, the Chili Daug and the Autobahn, which is “basically like a German dog” with sauerkraut, caramelized onions and brown mustard. 

Music is also on the proverbial menu at Hot Daugs, and Brad said his rack of records will also always represent the locals, from current/recent Northeast Wisconsin artists to the area’s “Polka King,” Romy Gosz. 

Hosting live music, he said, has always been one of the married musicians’ plans. 

Brad said he’s been a musician for 35 years, perhaps best known as a punk rock guitarist, having released countless albums and songs and performing across the country since his teens, at times with Amber. 

He said his repertoire has covered all genres and many instruments, with his most recent (entirely) solo creation – the self-recorded, five-song “Surfin’ With Brad Daugs” – digitally released on Bandcamp in April. 

“One of the big selling points to me about this space was that it could be used as a venue, because back 25 years ago (when it was a coffee shop), my band played here, Amber’s band played here, etc.,” Brad said. “I had been here, and I’d seen it as a music venue, so it was easy to imagine it.” 

Though Hot Daugs hasn’t hosted live music yet, he said it’s in the works. 

Due to limited capacity, though, Brad said he’ll be limiting promotion. 

“I like the idea of not having it be like a traditional event… It would be more like a pop-up show,” he said. “Basically, (we’ll) announce it a day ahead of time.” 

Follow the restaurant’s Facebook page for updates. 

Daugs undaunted 

Brad said what would have been Hot Daugs’ first concert – featuring his long-time band, The Onions, reunited with the group’s former frontman, Rev. Norb – was postponed indefinitely following his stroke. 

However, he and Amber said despite the setback and unplanned week away, they’re not discouraged from their dreams in the least. 

One short-term goal, the co-owners said, is to expand the shop’s hours to serve the dinner crowd as they had for their first three weeks – a schedule once again possible thanks to the new employees. 

Event catering is also forthcoming, Amber said, as well as possibly adding sandwiches to the limited menu. 

Brad said with the restaurant up and running, the two may soon resume Little Sprouts Farm. 

“I’d like to incorporate (the microgreens) into some of the hot dogs,” he said, “and then it would also be nice to have them for sale here for people who would want to buy them.” 

More ambitiously, Amber said, they’ve discussed larger events, such as a block party on nearby Chicago Street or reviving the bygone WienerFest in nearby Whitelaw. 

Some of their “crazy thoughts,” Amber said, have included a mobile hot dog cart, a second location or even franchising. 

Looking well into the future, the couple also said they “want to be at this for the next 45 years.” 

“If my health holds up, yeah, I would like to be here forever,” Brad said. 

For now, though, Amber and Brad said they simply “relish” their opportunity with Hot Daugs, as well as the community’s support – and one another. 

“I mean, this is the American dream,” Amber said. “This is the stuff they talk about – being your own business owner, right? … And Brad being there, being my backbone and being my partner in this journey has been really, really special. I couldn’t do it without him.”