n TASTE
HUNGRY FOR MORE
How Sonny Mayugba went from struggling musician to restaurant entrepreneur
BY Blair Anthony Robertson PHOTOS: Debbie Cunningham
I
Sonny Mayugba is a partner in the
soon-to-open Solomon’s Delica-
tessen in downtown Sacramento.
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comstocksmag.com | May 2019
t’s around 1992, and a long-haired
dude in his early 20s is sitting with his
friend at Taco Loco, a popular Mexican
eatery on J Street in Sacramento. They’re
eyeballing the customers, waiting to
pounce.
At this point in his life, Sonny Ma-
yugba dreamed of being a rock star, but
his band, Phallucy, was struggling and
he was flat broke. Decades before he
would become one of the most dynam-
ic food-focused entrepreneurs in Sac-
ramento and a force in a food-delivery
startup now worth half a billion dollars,
he was on the prowl for free grub.
“We’d sit and wait and look for a cou-
ple where one of them didn’t finish the
food, and when they left, we would grab
it before it got bussed,” recalls Mayugba,
now 47. “We’d cut off the part they had
been eating — and we’d eat the rest. I
lived out of a storage shed and was basi-
cally couch surfing.”
Today, Mayugba is as hungry as
ever. He recently celebrated the sev-
enth anniversary of Red Rabbit Kitch-
en & Bar, the lively Midtown spot he
co-owns and says has racked up $14
million in revenue since it opened. He
just launched Tiger, the restaurant and
bar on K Street in downtown that serves
New American cuisine, dim sum style.
He’s a partner in the soon-to-open Sol-
omon’s Delicatessen, also on reinvigo-
rated K Street near Golden 1 Center; the
new owner of iconic Sacramento brand
Grateful Bread; and the creator and
owner of the coming Market + Makers
at lower Broadway, a 16,000-square-foot
food hall and market.