A local gem: Marathon Deli owner George Soldatoe talks about his experience in College Park with the University of Maryland community.
Photo by Colleen Neely
George Soldatoe, the owner of Marathon Deli has run a niche business with his wife, Maria, for the past 30 years that has kept the University of Maryland students swarming the small restaurant, especially on weekends.
Marathon Deli offers a menu of Greek favorites and boasts of having the best gyros in College Park. One food item, in particular, draws a lot of customers in french fries with Marathon sauce. Customers speculate as to what’s in the sauce, but the owners are not willing to share the recipe. Lines frequently spill out of the restaurant on weekends, as people come from the bars or local greek life parties to get food.
Soldatoe says he runs Marathon Deli very deliberately. Half of his employees are students at UMD and half are residents from Prince George’s County. He also intentionally purchases food for the restaurant from Greece, saying, “I like to buy Greek produce to help my country.”
Image by Dimitris Vetsikas from Pixabay
Soldatoe says he has a good relationship with the College Park community because of his respect for everyone who comes through his door.
“Doesn’t matter if you’re [a] student and drunk,” Soldatoe says, he gives everyone the same service and good food. He believes that this is part of the reason for his continued success in College Park.
That success might increase in the next several years, as Soldatoe plans to move Marathon Deli to a temporary location while its current spot on Route 1 is developed into an apartment complex. Current plans include retail spaces that Soldatoe says Marathon Deli will move back into.
In the meantime, while Soldatoe wouldn’t say exactly where Marathon will be moving to, he did say it would be “next to the bars.” This presumably refers to Cornerstone Grill and Loft, Terrapins Turf and RJ Bentley’s, several bars on and close to Route 1 that are frequented by UMD students.
Because Marathon Deli is busiest at night Thursday-Saturday (while many students are on Route 1) Soldatoe said that moving closer to the bars will help business “like crazy.”
“It’s a cultural thing,” said Destiny Minker, a University of Maryland sophomore psychology major. “Most people at UMD have gone to Marathon and they talk about it. That makes you want to go. And the fries are only $3.”
Photo by Colleen Neely
Minker is partially correct. Normally the fries are $3.50, but Soldatoe introduced a late-night menu that lowers the price to $3 after 10 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.
“I know after the bars nobody has a lot of money,” Soldatoe said. Indeed, a lot of customers at Marathon Deli past 10 p.m. on the weekends are students who had left bars or parties.
Many students at UMD consider Marathon Deli to be “everything,” University of Maryland sophomore criminology and criminal justice major Melanie Duque said. “It’s part of our culture.”