Macon native and owner of Francar’s Buffalo Wings restaurant, Carl Fambro uses his chicken wing recipe to give back to the Mercer University community.

Fambro comes from a family of bakers. His grandma influenced only the women in his family to bake desserts.

“I got none of that, but I can make sauces,” Fambro said.

Before working in the restaurant business, Fambro served in the Army and worked in the kitchen. His experience in the Army gave him the confidence to start Francar’s.

“Well I never ever wanted to cook but when I got out of the service, one of the things I said was I going to work for myself,” Fambro said.

Fambro got into the wing business more than 25 years ago. He says it was popular at the time and there were no other wing restaurants in Macon. Fast forward to 2009, Fambro moved Francar’s to Mercer Village.

Fambro experienced a lot of trial and error while trying to create the perfect sauce.

“When I got in the kitchen and I started making up sauce and it took a while. You know it’s not overnight. Took me about two and a half years to get good at it. And the last 15 years I’ve been really good at it,” Fambro said.

Out of his 40 sauces, Mercer Gold and Boomerang were influenced by Mercer student input and the school itself.

Mercer Gold, the most popular flavor, is based off of Mercer University’s school colors, orange and black, the gold standing as the orange. Boomerang is influenced by a student who suggested that Fambro’s hot sauce was too hot and his mild was too mild. So, he made something in between.

“Wings, wings and more wings,” Fambro said.

Being a Mercer graduate, Fambro has a connection with the college town and the people in it. One of his favorite things about running a restaurant is the community.

“So it’s not just doing restaurant stuff, we try to do stuff that helps the community, too. So we just keep plugging away, every day,” Fambro said.

Republish