Text and Photos
By Shari Benyousky
Guest Columnist

Column Note: This is the twelfth column in the Dives and Diners series in which a small group of Warsaw Breakfast Optimist Club members and their guests road trip to explore the diners and dives of Kosciusko and the surrounding area.

WARSAW — On a rainy Friday around 11:15 am, I arrived at Cardoso 520 to take pictures. The staff at 520 E. Winona, Warsaw, were flicking on the lights, arranging napkins, and writing the daily specials on the board with colored chalk. A blonde waitress name Stacey brought me a cup of coffee. She figured out that I was a journalist and said a little nervously, “It’s only my second day. Wow. I read Diners and Dives all the time. No pressure on me!”

Cardoso 520 opened its doors only a few years ago. They bill themselves as a new-style American restaurant with a Mexican twist. You’ll find a fascinating mix of both traditional and non-traditional Mexican fare such as salmon, curry, tacos, avocado and egg toast, enormous bowls of various stews, and, for breakfast, the most amazing stuffed strawberry French toast that I’ve ever tasted. Sometimes plates are garnished with edible flowers.

Sign Wars Wildcard #1 Joel Wihebrink of WLM Wihebrink Landscape Management arrived. “Been a while since I’ve been in here.” He brushed raindrops from his shoulders. “I used to come here and kill time with Tom Ray while our kids were doing swim practice. It’s been a minute.” Joel’s last kid is graduating and just signed with a college to swim.

“We’ll both be empty nesters.” I nodded. My youngest is graduating from Warsaw High School this year too.

Sign Wars Wildcards #2 arrived — Julie and Andy Tuinstra of Boggs Automotive. They arrived together, both in uniform.

The regulars settled in and gave orders to Waitress Stacey who handled multiple tickets with expertise even though she said, “I got this, but you will see me fumbling a bit.” She didn’t.

“So, how did sign wars start?” REMAX Realtor Jeff Owens asked our guests who were still wondering if this lunch was a good idea. He squirted some hot sauce and licked it tentatively. “Oof! That’s crawl-up-the-back-of-your-tongue hot sauce!” He squirted more.

Sign Wars Julie Tuinstra smiled. “Since we bought the second Boggs location out on 1721 E Center, I wanted our sign to be different. I always say that if you can make your customer smile, they’ll remember you, right? Cheetos 2 for $1 — nobody remembers that. So, then COVID happened, and we were all stuck in our houses and needed a good laugh. Instead of my usual joke on the sign, I put up ‘Want to start a sign war? It’ll be a gas!’”

Sign Wars #2 Joel Wihebrink nodded. “It was April or May of 2021, and I was driving down Center Street with my wife when I saw the Boggs sign. I didn’t know the Boggs, but I told my wife, ‘What the heck. I’m going to do it.’ I wanted to get other businesses in the game, so I stopped by Penguin Point and bought like 20 cheeseburgers and fries, and took them out to Boggs to introduce myself. Two days later WSBT TV was in my office wanting an interview, and the rest of Sign Wars is history.”

24/7 Car Guy Chris Plack reached for his bowl of soup. “Has the sign war helped your businesses?”

Joel folded his arms and leaned back. “It sure has helped with awareness. We’ve had people bring us cookies and stop by to take pictures with the Wihebrink sign when we switch to honoring service members for the last week or so of May.”

Andy Tuinstra frowned. “Hey, WE haven’t gotten any cookies!”

“But,” Julie Tuinstra added. “We’ve grown from one employee when we bought the business in 2017 to 20 employees at two locations now. Sign Wars certainly helped. One time I pretended that one of the other war signs had hurt Boggs. I came to work with a cast and crutches and had them take a picture under the sign. Another time Andy wished me a happy 80th birthday as a joke. I went out and got the costume of an 80-year-old and took my picture again. It makes customers laugh, and we have a good time too.”

Sign Wars Andy Tuinstra uncrossed his arms to take a bite of his burger. He chewed thoughtfully. “It’s true. These days we need to take extra good care of our staff.”

Sign Wars Joel shook his head. “I’ve actually had to fire customers this year. I’ve had to say, ‘I’m sorry, but you won’t treat my workers that way.’”

Sign Wars Andy agreed. “Absolutely. Workers are precious these days.”

Sign Wars Julie ate the filling from a taco. “Our priorities are to keep our workers happy and be kind to customers.”

Sign Wars Andy added firmly, “We won’t put a Band-Aid on something wrong with your car. We fix things right. Even though our job is harder these days. Harder to get parts. Harder to get quality parts. Harder to keep labor.”

“I’ve had to raise my payroll rates 80% in the last two years just to slow the loss of my employees.” Joel Wihebrink picked up a cerveza with lime. “I don’t need to gorge myself with inflated rates or upcharges. I just need to pay my bills and keep my people happy too.”

Cardoso 520 Erica Cardoso had been listening from her spot behind the desk where she was making sure the restaurant ran smoothly. “What are the balloons for?” 1st Source Banker Paul Finley asked her. I took the opportunity to put down my pen and take a bite of my egg and avocado toast. It was perfect.

Erica turned the balloon’s face towards us. “It’s Mother’s Day. For someone from Mexico, it’s celebrated earlier on May 10th,” she told us with a big smile. “We love our mothers.”

Cardoso 520 is a family-owned restaurant. Many members of the family work there. I’ve had Alex as a waiter and Eduardo as a chef. The interesting combinations found on the menu are all their collaboration. “We like to try new things,” Alex told me the last time I was in and tried their chicken stew. “Our mom used to make a huge pot of this on the stove and we would eat it for every meal for a few days. It’s so good.”

Once our Sign Wars wildcards had finished eating and complimenting the food, Social Worker Vicky Owens pulled out a mysterious black bag. “We had a little something special for you,” REMAX Realtor Jeff Owens said with his trademark mischievous smile. He pulled out some whiteboards and markers. “We brought you some signs for a Mini Diners and Dives sign war!”

Sign Wars Julie’s eyes lit up. “I only have 60 characters to use on my Boggs sign. I’m jealous of those electronic signs. THIS is great!”

Joel dashed off something and held it up. “Idiot,” it said with an arrow pointing at 24/7 Plack. “I’m hurt!” Plack pouted. “Does this mean that you are the villain in this sign wars thing?”

“We seem to be the Pitbull often,” Wihebrink agreed. He rubbed the board clean and wrote again.

“Julie’s better at this than I am.” Andy took the sign from Julie and held it up. “Gets Dirty!” It said about Wihebrink Landscaping.

Wihebrink held up his sign towards Boggs Automotive. “Gassy!” They chortled.

REMAX Realtor Jeff Owens tittered over in the corner. Sign Wars Julie peeked over at another whiteboard he was writing and guffawed.

“Hurry up,” 1st Source Banker Paul told Owens. “You know you don’t have to explain the joke too!” REMAX Jeff handed the sign over the remnants of our devoured lunches to Andy.

“Does WEED!” the sign proclaimed about Wihebrink Landscaping.

I nearly choked on my last avocado slice. “You know when we detail the cars, we CAN tell who does weed by how their cars smell!” Andy Tuinstra chuckled, plucking a last French fry from his plate.

“Surprise, surprise!” 24/7 Plack packed half of his steak fajita wrap to go.

“Sadly, lunch is up,” Julie Tuinstra rose. “I’m filling in today for Boggs Driver today. That’s when we come and get your car and do the oil change or repair and return the car to you. People at work love it. But I’ve got to get back!”

“The egos are bruised, but the stomachs are happy,” Banker Paul joked. Our stomachs and palates were thrilled with the excellent food and fast service.

TIP – Be sure to try out Cardoso 520 weekend brunch items. Seriously, the stuffed strawberry French toast thing is addictive. Say hello to Erica, Alex, Eduardo, and Stacey along with the rest of the crew. This restaurant is VERY special, and so are they.

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