Thursday, January 23, 2025, 5:54PM |  29°
MENU
Advertisement
Lou Duco, 65, of Lincoln Place, greets a ticket holder who arrives at Suite 66 before a recent Penguins game at PPG Paints Arena.
3
MORE

PPG Paints Arena concierge thrives on building relationships, houses

Rebecca Droke/Post-Gazette

PPG Paints Arena concierge thrives on building relationships, houses

Lou Duco didn’t hesitate.

A few years ago, when a female hockey fan dropped her cell phone beneath the retractable seats at PPG Paints Arena, Mr. Duco rustled through the dust, dirt and trash to retrieve it, ripping his suit in the process.

“Wouldn’t everybody?” Mr. Duco said. “That’s what we’re here for.”

Advertisement

Truth be told, Mr. Duco’s here for a lot more than finding lost phones or any of the other tasks he performs nightly as the concierge at Suite 66, the high-end club across from the Penguins’ dressing room that the organization uses to entertain its top clients, co-owners, upper management and players.

Mr. Duco, 65, of Lincoln Place is a retired union carpenter with a thick Pittsburgh accent. He’s also active in his Roman Catholic church, St. Maximilian Kolbe in Munhall, and every summer travels to rural Kentucky to lead a group of 130 or so volunteers to build a house for a less-fortunate family.

It’s an endeavor the Penguins are proud to have supported.

“He’s the guy who, if you ask him directions to a gas direction, he won’t point; he’ll say, ‘follow me,’ and he’ll take you to where you’re going,” Penguins president/CEO David Morehouse said. “He does it here every day.”

Advertisement

Mr. Morehouse said Mr. Duco once drove a fan who was hit by a puck to the hospital, then visited later that night. Mr. Duco has shown up unannounced to Mr. Morehouse’s son Jackson’s hockey games and willingly works on his off-days if there’s a concert at the arena and co-owner Mario Lemieux’s daughters want to go.

On game nights, Mr. Duco’s duties range from greeting guests to explaining memorabilia to making sure a player’s parents are comfortable if they’re in town.

The environment is not exactly typical for a carpenter, but Mr. Duco has functioned like this for years. After he got out of the U.S. Air Force in 1972 and was working as a bartender at the Pittsburgh Golf Club, Mr. Duco got to know members of the Hillman, Scaife and Frick families.

Soon, the relationships escalated to the point where he began working house parties for them.

“You learn a lot about service with the ‘blue bloods,’ ” Mr. Duco said. “Serve from the left, take from the right. When to take a coat, when not to. I learned all that.

“Younger people now, they’re waiters or waitresses. They never learn about that old style of service.”

While his buddies were doing side work within their trade, Mr. Duco preferred to do something else. His “changeover,” he called it. When his shift ended in the afternoon, he could shower, change clothes and become a new person.

Literally.

“It’s refreshing,” Mr. Duco said. “Something different.”

He started as an usher back at Civic Arena and eventually found his way to the suite level. He even worked for a time as a carpenter.

But when PPG Paints Arena opened in 2010, the Penguins wanted Mr. Duco to be 100 percent devoted to Suite 66, named after Mr. Lemieux and the number he wore during his Hall of Fame career.

“All of our employees are great, but if I were to hold up a model of someone who best represents our customer service approach, I couldn’t think of a better person,” the Penguins’ chief operating officer, Travis Williams, said. “Lou’s tremendous.”

And busy.

The house-building trips began about eight years ago when the Rev. Dan Sweeney, the pastor at his church, on a whim asked Mr. Duco if he would like to give it a shot.

After supervising a group of about 15 people and presenting the keys to the new homeowners, Mr. Duco knew he had found his calling.

“It was touching moment,” said Mr. Duco, who has been married to wife, Marcia, for 31 years and has three sons: Keith, Tony and Bob. “I knew I was hooked.”

The group raises about $150,000 a year through various fundraisers. That covers the cost of the house plus food and travel for the 130 or so that go.

Father Sweeney purchased land a few decades ago where the group lives for the 10-day trip, always around the Fourth of July.

There are four showers, and Mr. Duco and others sleep in tents, but they get breakfast, lunch and dinner made by the food crew that shops and cooks for those working.

“We half-rough it,” Mr. Duco joked.

As a carpenter, he spends the winter analyzing housing plans and ordering materials. There’s a trip in April to check out future job sites with a Kentucky-based coordinator.

During the build, one group may dig a water line while another paints. Mr. Duco has a hand in most tasks. Especially important is that construction isn’t the biggest lesson.

“The program is to show the youth the Christian way, how to help people and what to do,” Mr. Duco said. “It can be a reality check.”

It’s a way of life for him, the same as running underneath the stands to retrieve a lost cell phone.

And remember that suit Mr. Duco ripped?

The Penguins bought him a new one, a small consolation for how much he adds to the atmosphere around the rink.

“There’s nobody happier,” Mr. Morehouse said. “That rubs off on people, and it’s valuable for us. He’s what I think about when I think about a Pittsburgh guy. Tough but kind. Bighearted and smart.

“He’s really a Pittsburgh story.”

Jason Mackey: jmackey@post-gazette.com or on Twitter @JMackeyPG.

First Published: December 26, 2016, 5:00 a.m.

RELATED
SHOW COMMENTS (0)  
Join the Conversation
Commenting policy | How to Report Abuse
If you would like your comment to be considered for a published letter to the editor, please send it to letters@post-gazette.com. Letters must be under 250 words and may be edited for length and clarity.
Partners
Advertisement
Pirates pitcher Paul Skenes, right, plays a “Bucco Trivia”game — inspired by the old $50,000 Pyramid game show from the 70s and 80s — with Pirates fan Owen Howe of Squirrel Hill at PiratesFest at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center Downtown Sunday Jan. 19, 2025. The three-day festival, which wrapped Sunday, features player autograph signings, Q&As, game-show-style events with players and fans and other family friendly activities to gear up for baseball season.
1
sports
Joe Starkey: Pittsburgh desperately needs the Pirates right now. Is anybody home?
Steelers safety Minkah Fitzpatrick (39) and linebacker T.J. Watt (90) stand on the sidelines during an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns in Pittsburgh, Monday, Sept. 18, 2023.
2
sports
Brian Batko's Steelers mailbag: Is Minkah Fitzpatrick's decline on the player or the coaching?
Michael Lyons, who was appointed president Downtown-based PNC in February, 2024, is leaving to become president and CEO-elect at Fiserv, a global provider of payments and financial services technology.
3
business
PNC president to leave after less than a year on the job
Signage is pictured at Penn State University Fayette campus on Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2024, in Uniontown.
4
news
Penn State’s current campus ecosystem is ‘not sustainable,’ commonwealth campus chancellor says
U.S. Steel's Edgar Thomson Plant in Braddock. Workers penned an open letter this week making it clear that they want the steelmaker to be sold to Nippon Steel, not domestic rival Cleveland-Cliffs.
5
business
Steelworkers make fresh plea to Trump to save U.S. Steel-Nippon deal
Lou Duco, 65, of Lincoln Place, greets a ticket holder who arrives at Suite 66 before a recent Penguins game at PPG Paints Arena.  (Rebecca Droke/Post-Gazette)
Lou Duco waits to greet a guest Tuesday before the Penguins game against the Rangers.  (Rebecca Droke/Post-Gazette)
Lou Duco is the concierge at Suite 66, named after Mario Lemieux, and helps fans with their needs at PPG Paints Arena.  (Rebecca Droke/Post-Gazette)
Rebecca Droke/Post-Gazette
Advertisement
LATEST sports
Advertisement
TOP
Email a Story