If you’re a San Antonian, you may not want to imagine your weekend without brunch at the city’s beloved Magnolia Pancake Haus. Tricia Fleming Schleicher, the daughter of the restaurant’s founder Robert Fleming, can relate.

Schleicher moved to Wisconsin for college, earning her bachelor’s degree in civil engineering and MBA from Marquette. After six years working for a general contractor, she felt drawn back to San Antonio, her parents, and the restaurant that was such a big part of her teenage years.

“By that time, I knew my dad wanted to retire. I loved the restaurant—it had been around for nearly 20 years at that point—and I didn’t like the idea of it not staying in the family,” she told us.

Schleicher was engaged at the time, and her first order of business was using her general contracting project management skills to build the event center Magnolia Halle, where she and her husband were married.

By 2019, she had fully stepped into her role as President of Magnolia Pancake Haus, also overseeing Magnolia Halle and the brand’s growing catering business. The COVID pandemic hit hard, but Schleicher took it in stride.

“My dad jokes that if he had been running the business at that point, he would have just closed it all. There were so many hoops to jump through to stay in business and make payroll, it was definitely a challenge,” she admits. But Schleicher endured and even opened a third location in December 2020. The main location recently moved to a larger space at Northwoods to accommodate even further growth. The event center and catering business are thriving as well. In addition to inheriting the family business, Schleicher also “inherited” the Steven Bankler CPA, Ltd. team, who had been working with Fleming for years. “There is this fluid contact that doesn’t exist with most CPAs,” she reflects. “With the Bankler team, you’re not left wondering what to do and hoping they return your call.” Learn more about Magnolia Pancake Haus at www.magnoliapancakehaus.com