Grill Concepts Inc

The parent company of the Daily Grill chain of restaurants announced Wednesday that a dozen top executives would take a 10% pay cut to help offset the effects of the ailing economy. The pay cut, effective immediately, will affect executives whose annual salaries range from $100,000 to $350,000, said Philip Gay, president and chief executive of Grill Concepts Inc., based in Woodland Hills. Four of the executives are members of the company's board of directors.

The owner of the Daily Grill and other upscale casual restaurants said Tuesday that remaining a public company had become too costly and it would ask shareholders to approve a plan to cease registration of its stock and pull its shares off the public market. Directors of Grill Concepts Inc. in Woodland Hills approved a recommendation by a special committee of independent directors to halt stock registrations and withdraw the company's shares from the Nasdaq stock market.

The Brentwood-based operator of the Daily Grill restaurants disclosed Tuesday that it expects to acquire most or all of the 19 remaining Hamburger Hamlet restaurants in a transaction valued at more than $10 million. Grill Concepts Inc. said the transaction is part of a Bankruptcy Court plan filed by Hamburger Hamlet Inc., which has been in Chapter 11 reorganization. If all 19 of the restaurants are acquired, Hamburger Hamlet would no longer exist as an independent chain.

The Sherman Oaks-based Hamburger Hamlet restaurant chain on Tuesday announced the resignation of its chief executive and the collapse of a deal under which it would have been acquired by the operator of Daily Grill restaurants. Brentwood-based Grill Concepts Inc. was to have paid more than $10 million for the 19-restaurant chain under a Bankruptcy Court reorganization plan filed in July by Hamburger Hamlet Inc., which has been under Chapter 11 protection since December 1995.

Grill Concepts Inc. said it expects its newly opened Daily Grill restaurant in Irvine to increase the company's annual sales by about 10%. For 1995, the company reported sales of $20.3 million. The Irvine outlet, which opened this week, expands the company's network of Daily Grills to seven throughout Southern California.