Print

Email story

Comment

Letter to the editor

Selmon's digs in for growth

The football legend's investment group will buy an 80% stake in the chain with an eye toward faster expansion.

By SCOTT BARANCIK
Published October 30, 2007

Lee Roy Selmon, right, and Bill Allen, CEO of OSI Restaurant Partners LLC, embrace after a Tampa news conference Monday to announce the sale of the Lee Roy Selmon Group. The Selmon investors will own 80 percent of the business, OSI 20 percent.
	[Ross Mantle | Times]

ADVERTISEMENT [Willie J. Allen, Jr. | Times] Selmon and Barli plan to significantly speed up the chain's expansion schedule and open its first location outside Florida by 2010

Lee Roy Selmon, retired Tampa Bay Buccaneers defensive lineman and co-founder of an upscale barbecue concept in 2000, is finally playing offense.

Under a deal expected to close by year-end, the 53-year-old legend will significantly boost his 10 percent stake in the six-restaurant Lee Roy Selmon's chain. He and brand president Peter Barli said Monday that their investment group will purchase an 80 percent stake from Tampa-based OSI Restaurant Partners, which owns Outback Steakhouse and other popular brands, for an unspecified sum. The pair plans to significantly speed up the chain's expansion schedule and open its first location outside Florida by 2010, a direct challenge to OSI's belief that the Selmon name might not catch on beyond the bay area.

OSI chief executive Bill Allen called Lee Roy Selmon's "a proven success" but said "there comes a time when a brand is best served" by the people who run it day to day.

"I've learned a lot," Selmon said of his time with OSI, where he has served as a director since 1994. "As we look to the future, we're very excited."

Barli and Selmon said they are still recruiting investors for the company they are calling Heartwarming Hospitality Inc., but they have no doubt the deal will be consummated. They plan to add two Selmon's locations in 2008 (Oldsmar and Ocala), six in 2009 (including Jacksonville, Gainesville, Orlando and Naples), and plan to have 30 open by 2012. The first Selmon's outside Florida is likely to open in Dallas or Atlanta.

"This is one of the reasons Lee Roy and I got together," Barli said, "to give us a chance to expand on our own."

The Selmon's chain has always been an underachiever. Founded in 2000, the same year OSI tested its ill-fated Zazarac concept, it was seen largely as a local play. A second location wasn't added until 2003. Selmon's didn't cross Tampa Bay to Pinellas County until 2005. It still hasn't ventured beyond central Florida.

It didn't help matters that OSI's flagship Outback chain had begun experiencing the sort of aches and pains often associated with aging restaurant brands, including an out-of-date menu and decor and customer fatigue. Nor was it easy competing with a half-dozen other OSI chains for expansion dollars. Several months ago, Barli and Selmon approached OSI. OSI was game but wanted to maintain a minority share, which Barli accepted. As a minority partner, OSI can continue lending Selmon's not only its expertise but help with purchasing and other functions.

Barli, 46, is a restaurant veteran. He was an area supervisor for Bennigan's in New Jersey and Pennsylvania when he decided to join Outback in 1991 as a line cook - a step down, to be sure, but Barli said it was worth it to get into the fledgling yet promising company. He eventually developed Carrabba's Italian Grill locations and in 2002 was named president of the Selmon's chain, a title he will retain.

Selmon, who resigned as athletic director of the University of South Florida for health reasons in 2004, said he expects to spend more time at the chain's restaurants in the future but won't hold an executive title.

He remains active in the bay area community, serving as president of the USF Foundation Partnership for Athletics in Tampa, chairman of the Florida State Fair, and a director of the Tampa Sports Authority, Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Tampa/Hillsborough County Youth Council, and USF's Institute of Black Life.

Scott Barancik can be reached at barancik@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8751.

[Last modified October 29, 2007, 23:29:33]