Kendall's Friendly Toast SOLD to Secret Shoppers

Well, this is an unusual development as one of Boston's quirkier restaurants has been sold to an unlikely suitor. Portsmouth's Seacoast Online has reported that popular Kendall Square brunch and more place The Friendly Toast has been sold. New owners are Massachusetts based real estate investor Scott Pulver and Eric Goodwin, who himself also owns Goodwin Hospitality & Associates, a Concord, NH business that hires secret shoppers to visit and critique large chain restaurants. Goodwin and Pulver have hired Marcus Thompson, formerly of the Barking Crab, Outback Steakhouse and Uno Chicago Grill to run both the four-year-old Cambridge outpost and 19-year-old New Hampshire original. The New Hampshire location has struggled with health code and infrastructure problems that forced the sale. A previously attempted sale of the Portsmouth restaurant from former owner Melissa Jasper to manager Chris Hartin went sour and ended up in court.

Expect changes "within a few months," as Goodwin and Pulver have promised "culinary-driven" — whatever that means — updates and possibly new restaurants under the same name. "People will notice differences."

UPDATE: a previous version of this post identified Scott Pulver as a co-owner of Goodwin Hospitality & Associates. That does not appear to be the case.

UPDATE 2, 9/28/2013: Goodwin clarifies what he meant by changes, insisting that fans won't lose anything that they love about the restaurants. "We look to accentuate the positives and hope to grow, but the roots are going to stay," he told Cambridge Day.
· New owners see ... updates for Friendly Toast [Seacoast Online]
· All coverage of The Friendly Toast on Eater [~EBOS~]