BoomerJack’s Heads Into 2021 With Growth Plans

BoomerJack’s Grill & Bar owner Brent Tipps, after a year in which COVID-19 forced a major contraction that turned into a recovery still hampered by the virus, is planning new restaurants in 2021 and 2022.

The Hurst company opened one restaurant this fall in Dallas. It plans to open two BoomerJack’s in North Texas in 2021 – in Plano in February and Lake Worth in April, both delayed from 2020 because of COVID. The company also plans to open its second Sidecar Social Lounge in North Texas – a relatively new concept the company debuted in Dallas. Tipps says he’ll be ready soon to disclose the new Sidecar location. Later in the year, Tipps plans to open a BoomerJack’s in Houston, the company’s first move outside North Texas.

In 2022, he plans to open another two BoomerJack’s and a Sidecar in Houston, and two BoomerJack’s in the DFW area. Those moves will take the company up to $90 million in projected annual sales, from what Tipps projects will be $65 million at the end of 2021.

And the company, which has 17 restaurant locations today and whose brands include the Bedford Ice House, is developing another new concept. “We’ve got another new concept coming out in 2021,” Tipps said in an interview. “I can’t really talk about it right now. Just a little premature.”

In preparation for the growth, Tipps this year created a new umbrella company called On Deck Concepts, with a new corporate office and support center, home to the company’s operations, marketing, training, HR, accounting, construction, and interior design. Critically, Tipps, who estimates it costs the company $2.5 million-$2.8 million to open a store, including land and construction costs, doesn’t want to outrun the company’s capacity to grow. He sat down for a Q&A on the company’s eventful year.

COVID

Tipps: “The restaurant business went through a really rough and challenging time. We’ve been very fortunate. We had to let a lot of people go (900 of more than 1,000 employees), but we brought everybody back as soon as we could. They were able to go out and collect stimulus money and unemployment money. As soon as we were able to open back up, we grabbed them all brought back in. (Even with current COVID-related restrictions on occupancy), we’re very happy with what we’re doing right now.”

Curbside and takeout

Tipps: "Early on during COVID, “we tried it, we were spending a lot of time and energy. We shut it down, we cleaned all the restaurants, we worked really hard to do all the maintenance. Now that we’re back open, our takeout and curbside volume has been ridiculous. We’ve had to train people just for curbside. We had doing stores that were doing a couple of hundred dollars a day in takeout. Those stores are doing $2,000 today in takeout.”

Why On Deck

Tipps: “We came up with the Sidecar brand. We already had the Icehouse brand. We just felt like if we’re going to continue to innovate and introduce new concepts, we’d do it under an umbrella corporation. If we acquire another brand, it’ll just fit right up under.”

Houston

Tipps: “Houston seems to be pulling pretty well. It’s been a challenge to find good locations down there.”

Construction materials

Tipps: “Construction materials are very high right now and in shorter supply. It does help having our own construction company. I can order ahead. I can warehouse and sit on it.”

Growth

Tipps: “We want to maintain three to five stores over the next couple of years. We’d like to see that go up, (to) five to seven. We’re not going to get crazy. We don’t want to overexpand. We want it to do it deliberately. Keeping our culture is the biggest thing. There’s no way to maintain the culture if we did 10 to 20 stores a year.”