Watch: Kyle Howard on Naperville’s Only Oyster Bar at Shuckin’ Shack

In this Firks 5 episode, host Dan Firks sits down with Kyle Howard, who owns Shuckin’ Shack Oyster Bar with his wife Angie. Kyle walks through the daily specials, from dollar-twenty-five oyster Mondays to seafood taco Tuesdays, the weekly trivia and live music nights, and his plans to bring the oyster bar concept to more of the western suburbs.

Read the full guide to Shuckin’ Shack in Naperville →

Video Transcript

Dan Firks: Hello, I’m Dan Firks, and this is Firks 5. Kyle, thank you so much for taking time out of your day today.

Kyle Howard: Thanks for having me, this is great.

Dan Firks: Yeah, I love your restaurant, it’s fantastic, the theme is amazing.

Kyle Howard: Awesome, and I’m just so excited to be here.

Dan Firks: And ask you five questions about your business and let the community know what you’re all about. Is that cool? So tell me a little bit about yourself.

Kyle Howard: So we are an east coast vacation beach bar. I almost wore my beach clothes, but it was just a little too cold out there.

Dan Firks: You’re welcome to wear your beach clothes.

Kyle Howard: We are a come-as-you-are kind of place. We’re probably right in between that high-end type of seafood restaurant and the lower-end fast food restaurant. We fit a niche that’s kind of like a vacation spot. People come here, relax, pretend like they’re on vacation, get great quality seafood, and really just have a good time.

Dan Firks: Yeah, no, the atmosphere here is just superb, it’s on point, it fits the theme of your restaurant, it’s just wonderful. So tell me, Kyle, how did you start your business?

Kyle Howard: So we were looking for an opportunity. We saw that there was a niche in the Naperville western suburbs market for kind of that middle-of-the-road seafood place, a casual place where people can come. My wife and I had always complained that there’s no good place to really relax, sit, and have oysters and seafood. So we came across this opportunity, and we thought this was exactly what was needed in the western suburbs.

Dan Firks: And did you always know it was going to be an oyster bar?

Kyle Howard: No. But we did see that this franchise came available, and so we decided that oyster bar is the perfect fit, and we thought it would really go well here. I don’t think we have another oyster bar in Naperville, so I think this is the only oyster bar.

Dan Firks: It’s hard to find one until you get into the city. Thank you for coming to Naperville.

Kyle Howard: Well, thank you, we’re glad to be here.

Dan Firks: So Kyle, tell me about some of your popular dishes that you have here at Shuckin’ Shack.

Kyle Howard: Sure. Well, of course the oysters are popular, that’s what we feature, and we carry a variety of oysters every day, typically anywhere between four and six different types, from the East Coast and some from the West Coast. So those are always popular. But we also have a sandwich, the Griega, which is a lobster roll, and that’s been probably our number one seller. We sell a lot of the Salty Steam Pots, which we’ll try today, and a lot of our po’ boy sandwiches are really popular too.

Dan Firks: Beautiful. And I know we’re going to talk about specials here in a minute, but I think I see oysters at a dollar twenty-five on Mondays.

Kyle Howard: That’s right, a dollar twenty-five on Monday.

Dan Firks: So Monday is a very popular oyster day, I would imagine.

Kyle Howard: And then on Tuesdays we do tacos, seafood tacos. You can kind of pick your protein, different types of fish, different types of shrimp.

Dan Firks: I’ve had the shrimp taco, it’s delish.

Kyle Howard: Yep, that’s a popular one. You can also get the protein fried, grilled, or blackened, so there’s a variety of ways to get it cooked.

Dan Firks: Variety is good.

Kyle Howard: Yep. Wednesdays we feature sandwiches for our specials, Thursdays it’s clams and mussels, and then Friday we have fish and chips as our special, and Saturday and Sunday it’s Cape Fear nachos and hangover fries. We have a special every day for everybody.

Dan Firks: That’s perfect. So Kyle, do you guys have any events going on throughout the week?

Kyle Howard: Yeah, we do. Every Tuesday we have trivia night, from seven to nine o’clock. We have two games of trivia, one starts at seven, one starts at eight. And then every Thursday night we have live music from seven to nine, featuring local artists. They both have good turnouts.

Dan Firks: Didn’t I just hear that a girl was here in the restaurant, went up, and started singing with the band? Is that true?

Kyle Howard: That’s right, yeah. We try to get acts that are interactive with the crowd and get people involved, and this past Thursday we had an eight- or nine-year-old girl who went up and sang a couple of songs with the band. Had a good time.

Dan Firks: That’s awesome.

Kyle Howard: Yeah, that’s community right there.

Dan Firks: Exactly. You could dance, sing, whatever you want to do, I love it. So Kyle, tell me about your hours and future plans.

Kyle Howard: Sure. We open every day at 11 o’clock. Sunday through Thursday we close at 10, and on the weekends we’re open till 11 o’clock. We’d like to get two, maybe three more locations somewhere in the suburb area, so we’d like to expand on this once we get this up and running, get things the way we like it. We’d like to look at bringing an oyster bar to other parts of the suburbs.

Dan Firks: I think that’s a great idea. Well, Kyle, thank you so much for taking time out of your day today to meet with us here at Firks 5, and I really appreciate your time.

Kyle Howard: Thank you. I’m happy you came, come back and eat oysters.

Dan Firks: Oh, I will, don’t you worry about that. Thank you for watching this episode of Firks 5. Make sure to follow us at Dan Firks for your most up-to-date real estate trends and market conditions, and when the time comes to buy, sell, or invest in real estate, call Firks first. We’ll be here. See you next time. Have an amazing rest of your day.

Read the full guide to Shuckin’ Shack in Naperville →