Jose “Pepe” Lopez, the 70-year-old founder and owner of Don Pepe Restaurant and J&L Companies, was recently honored by AEGAMA (Association of Galician Entrepreneurs in Madrid) in Galicia, Spain, for his impact and contributions as a leading Galician entrepreneur in America.
Since its founding in 1981, Don Pepe, famed for its enormous food portions, has become one of the most well-known restaurants in the Ironbound section of Newark. Lopez is credited with helping spur economic growth and revitalization in the Ironbound section of Newark for more than four decades. The Association of Galician Entrepreneurs in Madrid was created as a nonprofit in May 1990 within the Galician associative movement that came to America and Europe at the end of the 80s.
The Ironbound is also known as “Little Galicia,” named after the area in northwest Spain Lopez emigrated from in 1968 when he was 13. He was born in the village of Tellado in the province of Ourense in the Galicia region. Newark has the largest Galician community in the United States. Immigrants from Galicia came to New Jersey’s largest city in the 1970s and 1980s and their entrepreneurial spirit contributed to the rebirth of the Ironbound district.
Lopez came to Newark with his parents and siblings. He worked as a bag boy in a supermarket in the neighborhood, co-owned his first restaurant at age 20 called the Spanish Pavilion in Harrison in 1976. He and his wife, Luisa Lopez, whom he met in Spain and married in 1977, founded Spain restaurant in 1978, and then opened Don Pepe Restaurant in 1981, which they still own and manage.
They founded the real estate company J&L Companies in 1986, also based in Newark. J&L owns, develops and manages residential, commercial, and industrial properties
Lopez has also been deeply involved with the Galician community in the Ironbound district, where one-fifth of the residents are of Galician origin, according to reports.
Lopez has been president of the Ourense Center, where Galician emigres can meet.
