Restaurant Insurance in Michigan

Single-unit upscale modern American, 4,200 sf, 84 seats, $165 average ticket, 38 staff, Class C license, wine and craft cocktail program. Operator came to us at renewal of an existing program from a prior broker. The renewal program carried a liquor liability tower bound off the prior dec page across multiple cycles, scoped without attention to the Michigan Dram Shop Act's "name and retain" and written-notice requirements — and it carried no asset protection for the quota-limited Class C license. A Dram Shop Act claim then landed from an off-premises incident, and the procedural posture became central early.

We re-read the operator profile on video — liquor liability scoped to the Michigan Dram Shop Act "name and retain" and written-notice framework, server-training and refusal-of-service documentation, and separate quota Class C license-asset value protection. We rebuilt the program to put the Dram Shop Act framework and the license asset at the center.

Brewery-restaurant plus cocktail bar, 3,200 sf, 90 seats plus 16-seat bar, $36 average ticket, 26 staff, Class C license with brewing operation, late-hour operation. Operator came to us at lease signing on a new West Side brewery-restaurant. The standard restaurant package the operator was about to bind carried equipment-breakdown coverage scoped to a generic commercial template — the generic package treated brewing equipment and West Michigan lake-effect winter exposure as non-issues. A polar-vortex sprinkler-freeze later combined with a brewing-equipment failure to drive a compound closure.

We re-read the operator profile on video before binding — equipment-breakdown coverage scoped to brewing-and-food-service equipment, freeze-and-burst peril coordination, a property tower scoped to West Michigan lake-effect heavy-snow-load, and lost-income coverage sized to winter-storm contractor availability. We rebuilt the program against the brewery-and-winter reality.

Multi-unit fast casual (single of 5 in MI), 1,900 sf, 52 seats, $13 average ticket, 18 staff, no alcohol, dine-in plus takeout plus third-party delivery. Operator came to us at acquisition — taking over a 5-unit Michigan chain from previous ownership. The acquired program from the previous broker carried employee-claim coverage scoped to the federal 15-employee Title VII floor — a scope that left smaller-headcount units exposed, since the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act covers employers from the first employee. A discrimination claim then surfaced from a former employee at a small-headcount unit.

We re-read the multi-unit operator profile on video — employee-claim coverage scoped to the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act first-employee framework, a payroll-system review against Michigan's paid-sick-leave and minimum-wage requirements, and premises liability against MCL § 600.2959 comparative fault.