- January 9, 2025
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Lee Karlins, president of Caledon Concepts. Company is a restaurant group based in St. Pete that is the parent of two restaurants: Ceviche Tapas Bar and Rococo Steak. He’s been with the company since 2015 and has maintained a presence in the culinary industry for several decades, including roles at 2B Hospitality, Stonewood Grill & Tavern and Outback Steakhouse.
To some, leading a restaurant group with 120 employees generating $14 million in annual revenue across two establishments might sound a lot like herding cats. But Karlins literally herds cats: After work he goes home to his 5-acre property in Plant City, where he herds felines and a dozen or so other rescue animals.
Not kitten around: When he and his wife purchased their farm in 2023, there was a colony of approximately 30 feral or ‘community’ cats already claiming residence there. The duo paired up with local group McNeely Family Rescue to perform TNVR: trap, neuter, vaccinate, return (to field) to make sure the number of cats didn’t multiply and they would have a chance at a healthier life.
“We've gotten, like, 25 [or] 30, probably, all neutered vaccinated,” Karlins says, “So now you give these cats a really good life than they normally have, you know, food and shelter and all that.”
Farm-to-cat-cafe-table pipeline: The McNeely Family Rescue works with Catnip Cafe in Plant City, which is a double-sided restaurant that has a cat sanctuary on one side and a cafe on the other. “She supplies all the cats,” Karlins says of his connection, “When we have kittens [or] we find kittens, we give them to her, because she gets them adopted pretty quickly.”
Start ‘em young: Growing up in Connecticut, Karlins' first introduction to the world of animal care was a combination of riding and showing horses starting at age six and spending time on his uncle’s farm. He “Always had love for animals. We've always had animals at the house,” he says. Ultimately, the length of veterinary school and newfound interest in the culinary world starting with his jobs as a teen took him down a different professional path.
Tag team: Karlins and his wife spent two years looking for the perfect property before they landed on their Plant City residence. Karlins doesn’t mind commuting to St. Pete each day and the pair wake up at 6:15 each morning to care for the aforementioned clowder, which also includes two indoor cats, in addition to two horses, one mini horse, four mini ponies, two ducks and a mini donkey.
Why rescue: Karlins’ big heart for animals comes across in his stories. As a teen working in a veterinary office, he was directed by his father to not bring any ‘work’ home, yet several dogs and a sick pony ended up making their way to the property. “He said, ‘You can’t keep doing this to me. You’re killing me’,” Karlins says of his dad with a laugh. However, “It makes me pretty angry when you see animals being neglected or worse,” he says.
Critter cuisine: After working in food and beverage for so many years, one might be curious to know if that translates into the cuisine the animals consume, especially in an age where some pet owners exclusively serve their dogs bottled water. Karlins says his day job doesn’t intersect, but he is quite in tune with all the dietary needs. “The minis [ponies] are actually harder, and I realized that more over time, just because they can only be on grass for so long, so many hours a day,” he says, “I don't feed any of mine grain. They really can't get any sugars because of their body chemistry,” noting that the wrong diet can make them overweight or sick.
Mutual love: Karlins’ interest in animal care and rescue is certainly not an isolated incident. “Everybody that works for us in our restaurants, they all have animals. We talk about them all the time. It's a big deal for us. Our owners all have big dogs, my partner has a couple big dogs,” he says. “So it's a big deal for us and our company to try to do something, too.”
