Sunday, 28 March 2010

Change of focus leads Lims to close Bico’s


Photo by: Kevin Hervert, Kearney Hub
Boulee Lim, owner and manager of Bico's Cafe, shoots pool in the bar. Lim, who is closing Bico's after Sunday, has two live bands and a hip-hop vs. rock "battle" scheduled for the final weekend of business.

via CAAI News Media

Saturday, March 27, 2010

By KEVIN HERVERT Hub Staff Writer

KEARNEY — Historic Bico’s Café will go out of business after Sunday.

Boulee Lim, co-owner and manager of Bico’s Café, said he is concentrating on balancing family with the family business.

“I’m starting a family,” Boulee, 29, said. He and his wife, Linda, expect a son June 23.

Boulee Lim opened Delight Donuts at 324 Third Ave. in January 2006. Boulee’s uncle owns Delight Donuts in Lexington. Boulee’s parents, Khim and Hong K. Lo, will open a third Delight Donuts in Norfolk by the end of April.

Khim Lim and his wife Hong K. Lo purchased Bico’s Sept. 29, 2005.

“Economics were slowing down a little bit,” Boulee said. He said business at Bico’s turned mediocre after the 30th Avenue overpass closed.

Construction began March 15 on sewer, water and street pavement projects that could leave the 30th Avenue overpass closed until at least September. That main traffic artery is a block east of Bico’s.

“It was pivotal to our decision,” Boulee said.

Boulee plans to go out with a party with live music this weekend. Tonight (Saturday night), a rock band will “battle” with a hip-hop group.

Boulee managed the business as a restaurant and sports bar and kept the Bico’s Café name.

The Lims have had business ties to Kearney since 1990, when they opened the former Golden Dragon Chinese restaurant at 320 Third Ave.

Khim and Lo were born and raised in Cambodia and escaped The Killing Fields in 1979 by going to a refugee camp in Thailand and then moving to Fort Collins, Colo.

The communist guerilla group Khmer Rouge, which killed almost 2 million people from 1975-79 took power in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, and forced all city dwellers into the countryside and labor camps.

After escaping Cambodia and arriving in the United States, Lim and Lo moved to California, where Lim worked at a Chinese restaurant from 1980-1984. The family then lived in Greeley, Colo., and North Platte where Lim operated his first Golden Dragon restaurant from 1984-1995. Lim also operated a jewelry store in Denver.

Lim and Lo still own the building and property in south Kearney where Golden Dragon was located.

Boulee Lim grew up in North Platte until his sophomore year of high school. He graduated from a Rhode Island high school and earned his degree in business management in 2004 from Quinnipiac University in Connecticut.

Boulee previously owned a sports bar and grill called Jackrabbit Slims in Hamden, Conn., and a nightclub and disc jockey company called Next Step Promotions. He also operated three nightclubs in Connecticut and is an experienced caterer.

At Bico’s, he remodeled the west party room into a banquet facility.

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