FARMINGTON – Bryan Wood has lots of ideas to improve the Farmington Diner but still keep the home-style fare and comfortable atmosphere.

Wood is the new manager of the diner, a former train car with an addition, on Main Street, across from Hippach Field.

His brother Rusty Wood of Florida bought it this past fall from longtime owners, Michael and Rose Grimanis.

Bryan Wood has taken up residence in a trailer behind the diner to watch over the place.

He does “a little of everything; whatever needs to be done,” he said.

“If I need a dishwasher, I’m a dishwasher,” Wood said. “I just make it work.”

The place needs a lot of work, he said, as he looked about the diner from a table in a corner from the green and white checkered floor tiles to the vinyl covered booth seats to the wood Formica-topped tables.

He plans to slowly get into that as money and time allows. The plan is to keep it roughly the same and hopefully improve the food and diner itself to update it, he said.

The homestyle meals include pot roast, thick pork chops and prime rib and other favorites such as seafood.

“We try to do everything from scratch,” he said. “We’re trying to get into baking.”

He has plans to set up a Visa machine after he discovered a few people leaving because the diner doesn’t accept credit cards. He plans to change that, he said, because of lot of travelers use credit cards.

The former manager of Family Fare Restaurant in Farmington said he has the experience to make the place work.

He oversaw the renovations at that restaurant after a fire broke out in the kitchen there a few years back.

Wood also has cooked for years including hotels and mom and pop places.

“I think Farmington needs a diner,” Wood said. “They like the diner. It’s an icon for the Farmington area.”

People coming through from other states stop and eat.

Customers get big portions for little money, he said.

It’s family friendly, he said.

“It’s like a little meeting place,” he said.

There are eight employees, many of them having been there for years.

It’s been a little slow recently, he said, Thursday because of not having that much snow.

He expects that to change once more snow falls and people come into go skiing and snowmobiling.

Any changes he has planned to the outside and inside as well as the fare, will be done slowly.

Being born in Down East Maine, Wood said, he knows “You can’t do too many changes too fast.”