Fast Food Healthy Food

Fast Food Healthy Food

COMPANIES by Dave Szymanski | Tampa Bay Editor

The Tampa-based fast casual restaurant chain has signed agreements to take the chain deeper into the Tampa Bay area as well as out West and in the Southeast.

Dino Lambridis' father sent him to school so he could stay out of the restaurant business, in which both sides of his family worked. Lambridis earned a degree in aviation management and became a licensed pilot.

But it's hard to pull up the roots. These days, the 39-year-old entrepreneur, who was born in Florida and lived in Greece, has his feet on the ground and back in the kitchen.

"I guess you could say I have ketchup in my veins," Lambridis says. "I'm Greek. So by default, I grew up in the restaurant business."

He's growing a Tampa-based restaurant chain, Evos, which offers a healthier alternative to fast food chains by cooking food with hot air ovens, not deep fryers, broilers and gas grills, and using healthier ingredients. The result: 50% to 70% less fat and calories than other restaurants and no trans fats.

"I'm a creator and like to do new things," he adds. "Aviation is very set. Very rigid. There's not much impact I could have there."

Credit card start

Evos began in 1994. Lambridis and his two friends and partners, Alkis Crassas and Michael Jeffers, used 30 credit cards and spent $45,000 to found an experimental restaurant in South Tampa. All were tired of working for other companies, wanted to find an employer that shared their values and were looking for healthier alternatives for lunch and dinner.

"We were looking for a way to have a burger, fries and shake we didn't regret afterward," Lambridis says. "We realized we weren't the only ones. Wendy's, McDonald's, Burger King, Chick-fil-A, nobody out there was addressing this. It was a great opportunity. So we opened a test store."

But the partners found they were on a large learning curve. They had virtually no money for marketing and had to raise investment funds. No one knew about their company and they competed against corporate giants.

"We were mavericks," Lambridis says. "We spent a lot of money and time on the concept. All we had was word of mouth."

Today, despite no advertising, Evos has three locations in Florida and one in Las Vegas. The company is on a slow but national growth track.

It signed an agreement with a franchisee in Las Vegas to develop 207 locations in 12 western states in the next 10 years. It also signed franchise agreements to develop 21 restaurants in Atlanta and North Carolina and four more in the Tampa Bay area, including locations near the University of South Florida in Tampa, in Sarasota and in north Pinellas County. It is also speaking to investors in Detroit, Miami, California and New York.

It opened a location in Tampa's West Shore Plaza to capture people traveling from out of town. It wanted them to experience Evos and promote the concept back home.

Because of the failure of other healthy restaurant concepts, which grew too quickly and faced a mountain of real estate debt, Evos is trying to be careful about expanding too quickly. It spoke with executives of failed healthy restaurant companies, such as Delites and Healthy Bites, to find out what happened.

In some cases they expanded too fast. Delites had more than 120 locations. In other cases, they just picked the wrong locations, with the wrong demographics. The big competitors took notice. Wendy's rolled out a salad bar. For fast casual chains to take hold, people have to be willing to spend a little more for healthier food.

"Sometimes, some locations won't work," Lambridis said. "We all care about value."

The concept

Evos comes from the word evolve. Evos is fast food evolved.

But it is not a typical health food chain. It shares some things with fast food chains: It offers hamburgers, french fries and milk shakes on its menu. It is also planning to add drive-through locations. While these may not be as fast as the national chains, Lambridas wants to get the wait times down to 3 minutes. It is working on a drive-through for a Las Vegas location.

It places itself in the "fast casual" restaurant category - a hybrid of fast food restaurants, like Burger King, and casual restaurants, like Chili's and Applebees.

It is slightly higher priced than other fast food chains. If you pay about $6 for a quarter pounder, fries and shake at McDonald's, you'll pay about $8 at Evos. The average ticket price is actually a little higher, about $9.50. Ultimately value is what people look for.

"We're not trying to get rid of McDonald's," Lambridis says. "I love McDonald's. I'm a big fan. We just want people to have some options. There's room for more players to offer healthier options."

It actually considers Panera Bread and Chipotle its more direct competitors because of the food they serve and how they make it.

What advice does Lambridis offer for executives at other companies? Know your customers and have positive employees.

"Companies need to understand their customers, to know what their true needs are," he says. "Smaller companies may step in and offer better service and better products. You really need to do your research and really know what the customers want. You also need to surround yourself with upbeat people with good attitudes."

Great companies also need to listen to employees and encourage them to be candid.

"We get great ideas from new hirees," Lambridis says. "Sometimes they tear us apart. People speak freely. That's how our culture is."

While he notes that Evos is unique for its ingredients and cooking style, and does not have an identical direct competitor, Lambridis knows the kind of indirect competition the company faces from multinational companies with large marketing budgets.

"We're all vying for that lunch dollar," he says.

AT A GLANCE

Evos

Headquarters: Tampa

Business: Fast casual restaurant chain featuring healthier food

Founded: 1994

Revenues: Projected at $4 million in 2007

Locations: Tampa, St. Petersburg, Las Vegas. Franchisees plan expansion out West and in the Southeast with more than 200 locations in at least 12 states in the next 10 years.

Average restaurant volume: $940,000 a year.

Average expenditure per customer: $9.50

Employees: 40

Web site: www.evos.com

REVIEW SUMMARY

Company: Evos

Industry: Tampa-based fast casual restaurant chain

Key: Careful expansion and knowing customers' desires