Cecil Williams says he has “seen it all before”.

Competition doesn’t faze the 62 year-old owner of Chelsea Jerk Centre, who proudly states that his joint is the first established jerk spot in the nation’s capital, Kingston.

He is ready for all comers, even when the competition is from the big spending owners of Scotchies — the popular jerk restaurant franchise that has for years ruled Jamaica’s North Coast.

Scotchies , challenging Williams’ dominance, has now set up shop at 2 Chelsea Avenue, right across the road from where Chelsea Jerk Centre has been established for over three decades .

At Scotchies on Chelsea Avenue, the open-air aura and general infrastructure of Scotchies in Ocho Rios and Montego Bay is duplicated. The tables, benches and chairs are made from hardwood, the thatched roof of the timber Pagoda eating areas bring the rustic country ambiance into the heart of the city. However, the space is much larger than the two previous eateries, highlighting the intention of the investors — Jeremy McConnell, Tony Rerrie and Andrew Bogle — to go full force in pursuit of Kingston’s high-traffic jerk diners.

But even so, Williams is unperturbed.

A confident Williams says he hasn’t even been to his rival’s place across the road but he was told that “it has a good ambiance”, probably in reference to the distinct garden-like quality of the new Scotchies.

He insists that he’s not at all threatened by Scotchies, saying that many jerk centres have come and gone without posing any serious challenge.

“I’ve seen it all before… over the years, there have been a lot of competition,” Williams told Sunday Finance, when we visited his offices last week.

“In the early 1980s, there were a lot of competition and before Scotchies now, I remember 925 coming,” he said, the latter in reference to 925-JERK, the now defunct delivery jerk service that was a hit in the early part of the last decade.

“Everybody said ‘Bwoy Cecil, you have to be careful about 925’, and I said ‘Boss, all I’m doing is what I know best’,” Williams recalls

“And now? 925 is out of business,” he said, not boastfully, but (confidently).

The Chelsea Jerk Centre was founded by Williams in 1977, serving up only jerk pork on a platter at 9 Chelsea Avenue. The aim was to give Kingstonians the opportunity to eat authentic jerk without having to drive over 60 miles to the famous Boston jerk centre in Portland, the premier spot for jerk pork at the time. Soon after, an innovative Williams expanded into jerk chicken, carving out himself a niche market.

“It was basically intuitivity…Jerk pork was not established away from Boston yet and jerk chicken was actually not known,” says Williams.

“People drove here to see if chicken can jerk… I remember Boston used to do a few chicken but the biggest jerk chicken establishment was on Chelsea Avenue,” he boasts.

In 1984, Williams moved the jerk centre next door to 7 Chelsea Avenue and started its expansion into an eatery and bar. An by 1988, he says Chelsea Jerk Centre was one of the top eating spots in Kingston.

“It was a lot of hard work… I didn’t even do any (paid) advertising, just word of mouth,” he notes.

But success has come with it’s full share of adversities for Williams. In 1988, Chelsea Jerk Centre was destroyed by the ferocious Hurricane Gilbert and had to be rebuilt. In 2002, it was destroyed again, this time by fire, and Williams had to fork out more money to put up a new structure — this time a formal dinery with concrete structure from which it operates today.

Against this background, Williams scoffs at any talk of Scotchies possibly running him out of business. He cites his 30-odd years of experience and brand recognition of delivering “high quality food” and “excellent customer service” to diners. He refuses to go into details of his jerk recipe, but tells Sunday Finance that he uses seven different types of stick.

“Jerk is a very technical thing, it’s not like just cooking in a pot…Everything has to be precise and your season has to be meticulously mixed to get good quality,” he says, before declaring “Since Scotchies came to Chelsea Avenue, I haven’t seen any fall off in business.”

According to Williams, over 100 customers go to his dinery and bar daily. But he’s not staying complacent, and plans to at least “perk up” his jerk business.

“In business you always have to plan and we are setting up a more family-like atmosphere here,” says Williams.

It’s still early days yet and there’s no telling what the future will hold in this jerk war. But at the end of the day, the consumers of Kingston’s jerk will win because competition drives quality. At Chelsea Jerk Centre, a pound of jerk pork goes for $980, at Scotchies it will set you back $1,200 a pound.

Nobody wants to see a casualty in this battle, but let the games begin.