Sea Shanty owners plan two more restaurants, one for each daughter

While Gary and Kelly Williams built a devoted following at the Sea Shack on Hilton Head Island for seven years, their three fun-loving daughters reluctantly learned all about the food business.

"They hated having to hang around in the restaurant," Gary said. "They didn't realize I was teaching them the whole time."

That grooming soon will come in handy, because the family intends to open a similarly low-key, paper plate-style restaurant in the area for each daughter.

The Williamses got a third of the way to that goal when they recently opened The Sea Shanty in place of a former diner a few miles north of the S.C. 170-U.S. 278 intersection on S.C. 170 in Okatie.

Designed to be like the Hilton Head eatery the family sold four years ago, it is adorned with nautical paraphernalia and images of seafood in the windows.

The couple's middle daughter, 21-year-old Haley, runs the place with the guidance of her parents. Once it's established, the family plans to open two more restaurants for their other daughters, one for 24-year-old Chelsey and one for 19-year-old Kaylynn.

Haley, who couldn't sit still while working as a receptionist at a car dealership, said that experience convinced her working with Mom and Dad wasn't so bad after all.

"I like everything about it," Haley said. "I get along with my family better than anybody."

The family had long eyed Haley's new spot, which some of their former customers from Hilton Head have already discovered.

When it became available earlier this year, they asked their daughters what they thought.

This time, the young women jumped at the chance to get back into the business that's in their blood.

"They're the ones that actually talked us into doing it," Gary said.

If all goes well, he envisions franchises in the family's future. But that won't happen until he has taken care of each of his girls, he said.

After that, the Beaufort native hopes to move to the supply side of the business.

"I'm going fishing," he said.

OTHER BUSINESSES

Other recent business openings, closings and changes in the area:

• Business partners Jim Moore and Jeremiah Howard recently closed their SuperCycles & ATV business in Savannah and reopened at 30 Plantation Park Drive in Bluffton.

Moore, a Bluffton resident, said he started the business in Georgia because it required less money and red tape, but he has long wanted to move it closer to home.

The business began about three years ago out of necessity when he couldn't find affordable equipment for his son and two daughters, who loved to careen around the back yard on all manner of mechanical contraptions.

Moore, a member of the first ninth-grade class at Hilton Head High School, rode a motorcycle to school and introduced his passion to his kids at an early age.

"They would never go fast enough," he said. "They were just speed demons right from the beginning."

The store sells dirt bikes, ATVs and scooters as well as accessories, parts, service and gear. Moore said he soon plans to sell skateboards and small motorcycles, too.

WHAT IS ABOUT TOWN?

As you drive around southern Beaufort County, you notice a sign for a new shop, new construction or road work. Or you realize that an old store you once frequented has gone out of business. About Town answers the question, "What's going on here?"

If you have information about something that has changed the local landscape or if you wonder about one of those changes and would like us to tell you more about it, contact reporter Josh McCann at jmccann@islandpacket.com or 843-706-8145.