Craft beers were becoming more popular, Michael Norsworthy, president of 54th Street parent Kellan Restaurant Management Inc. said, and the company wanted to put more emphasis on the adult beverage side of the business. In new units, the privately owned company installed 54 beers on tap, served at 29 degrees, in an area of the restaurant with a television package, an open keg room and a communal fire pit on the patio.

Norsworthy said construction has started on three new 54th Street units, with openings this year to include two in the Dallas area and another in San Antonio.

“We’re comfortable with two openings a year,” Norsworthy said. “It’s a controlled, managed growth. The only people we have to keep happy is ourselves with no public shareholders.”

The company also offers “step up” items on the menu, providing a lower priced burger but offering options such as a filet mignon and premium bourbons and bottles of wine.

Entrées range in price from $7.99 to $22.49. In Nation’s Restaurant News' most recent Top 200 rankings, the brand had systemwide sales of $117.8 million in 2017, with growth of 9.6%. Average estimated unit volumes were $4.4 million.

Lazy Dog Restaurants LLC, which has 30 Lazy Dog Restaurant & Bar locations, late last year pioneered a new membership-only Lazy Dog Beer Club for its guests at 21 units in its core markets of California and Nevada as well as Illinois.

Exhibiting the marketing flexibility that comes with smaller regional chains — although the brand has a few locations in Colorado, Georgia and Texas as well — Lazy Dog has capitalized on its quarterly craft beer program to create a membership club for hard-to-find brews.

The brand debuted the program in October, giving guests the opportunity to buy a membership for $35 a quarter and get a cooler bag, beer kits that include eight bottles or cans from three different craft brewers and priority access to rare beer releases. 

The membership also comes with “automatic draft beer upgrades,” offering 22-ounce pours for the price of a 16-ounce on select beers.

With no background in restaurants, former retail executive Scott Moore and construction company owner Gus Evans opened their first Maple Street Biscuit Co. in Jacksonville, Fla., in November 2012. The breakfast-lunch concept, which is closed on Sundays, has grown to 31 restaurants in six states.

“We don’t have what they call store managers,” said Moore in an interview. “We have community leaders. Part of that is having people who know the community. Every store is named for the community it’s in. Even the coffee mugs have the name of the community where that store is placed at.”

Evans and Moore started with a menu that the latter calls “comfort food with a modern twist built around fresh-baked biscuits.” The best-selling
item is “The Squawking Goat,” which is a fresh biscuit layered with breaded chicken breast and a grilled goat cheese medallion and pepper jelly.

The corporate support team is always on call for the community leaders, he said. “Our job is here to serve them, so they can take care of the community,” Moore said. “They get a salary and also participate in a portion of the profits. That grows over a period of time.”

The community leaders don’t need to have restaurant experience, he said. The community leader over two restaurants in Knoxville, Tenn., was unemployed and nearly homeless when Maple Street took her on for training.