Frank Day

The 83-year-old's restaurant empire began in 1976 with the first Old Chicago restaurant in Boulder, local media reports show. He started a restaurant chain called Rock Bottom Restaurants, which he and his partner took public in the mid-1990s before Day bought it back in 1999 for $81 million, the Denver Business Journal reported. In 2010, he sold the chain for an undisclosed amount but stayed on as chairman.

In a 2011 lawsuit in California regarding payments for legal services — which was settled — Day is described as someone with a long history in the business world. A 2013 trial brief says he was involved in 30 to 40 ventures at that time, "including Lucra (high-performance custom cars) and a variety of restaurant and real estate venues."

Day owes the workers more than $1 million dollars, calculations from the mediation council show.

The Arizona Daily Star tried without success to reach Day and his appointee to manage the Mexico operations, Michael Frothingham, including calls and emails to his businesses and home. 

The Star first sent Day an email on Dec. 12, 2014 and a second one on March 15. On Feb. 2, a woman answered Day’s home phone in Boulder, but hung up when a reporter introduced herself. The reporter called back and left a detailed message.

The Star reached Jeffrey Sachs, the registered agent for the company until it dissolved in November, eight months after the Mexico operations shut down. He declined to comment and refused to pass on the reporter’s contact information to the Day family.

On Feb. 20, 2013 — 15 days after the closure — Frothingham was quoted by The Recycler, a trade magazine for the toner and ink jet remanufacturing industry, saying the Nogales factory closed after a merger deal failed.

“It’s really too bad because we finally had the sales, factory right-sized, and team in place to make the company very profitable,” he told the publication. “There will be three of us winding the company down trying to liquidate inventory, equipment and collect money.”

Frothingham, now president and CEO of DC Imaging LLC which also goes by ColorLabs Ink Innovations in Pennsylvania, did not respond to two emails sent to his personal email address provided by his office. The Star also called his home and left a voicemail.