Hooters clones scramble for share of Florida market

Nation's Restaurant News, Jan 13, 1992 by Jack Hayes

CLEARWATER, Fla. -- The city that saw the rise of the beach-style concept when the first Hooters unit opened in 1983 is now watching a battle for market share heat up among a dozen feisty competitors.

Operating with names like Cheerleader's, Knockers, Melons, Mugs 'n Jugs, Bleacher's, Zoomerz and Fraternity House, this glut of Hooters look-alikes is scattered along Florida's central Gulf coast in a chain that stretches some 150 miles from Tarpon Springs to Fort Myers.

"There's thousands of us around here," declared a staffer at Cheerleader's in Palm Harbor, a single-unit concept that offers signature food, tavern ambience and an all-female dining room crew clad in provocative uniforms -- similar in design to the Hooters concept but otherwise calling itself a sports bar.

And like the original Hooters -- which now has 64 units scattered as far away as Chicago, Phoenix, Indianapolis and Washington, D.C. -- the newcomers are also hungry to expand out of their nearly saturated home market.

"You're going to be seeing us all over the place," boasted Chuck Van Ness, general manager at eight-unit Zoomerz, a 5-year-old beach-themed tavern and grill concept based in Bradenton.

Eight-year-old Melons, which this month will grow to five units with the opening of new restaurants in Tampa and Islamorada on the Florida Keys, has its sights set on rapid growth also through franchising.

"We've been around since 1984, but we've just now started expanding," said Russ Latimer, one of Melons' founders. He is quick to point out that Melons has its own history and trademarked name, yet he admits: "Hooters is doing wonders for us; they keep dragging us right along."

Like the attractive Hooters girls who participate in local promotions for charities, community projects and sporting events, the Melons girls are a key asset to Latimer's concept. They will be cheerleaders for both teams playing in the Pro Legends Bowl in St. Petersburg on Jan. 18.

Yet Melons differs from Hooters in small points. For example, whereas Hooters offers just beer and wine, Melons features a full bar -- positioning the concept for a slightly older clientele, Latimer explained.

Fraternity House, a three-unit concept that opened in 1986, also has full liquor service. But the local chain's operators said the concept differs from Hooters in a few other ways.

"Our menu is much broader than Hooters, and we're coed in the dining room, meaning we do allow male servers (there's one male currently, but there were three at one point)," said Bettina Messer, general manager at the original restaurant in Tarpon Springs.

Fraternity House's female servers dress in striped cheer-leader skirts and either T-shirts or tank tops bearing the operation's logo. The menu runs from burgers, salads and sandwiches to ribs, steaks, seafood, Southwestern dinners, soups and an expanded line of desserts.

"The restaurants are taking on a homier look," confirmed Fraternity House franchisee Bobby VanRoten, who took over the Clearwater unit a little over one year ago with partner Eileen Flaxman. The image change is intended to attract more family business, he said.

"We've got a six-item children's menu and lots of regular customers in their 60s," Messer explained. "We're more family-themed."

But aside from the provocatively dressed all-female wait staffs, Hooters and its competitors consider themselves "wholesome family establishments." And the female point can become a touchy subject when it is raised.

"We don't push our women; we don't let them cut their shirts up as they do in some of the other places," said Mike Laney, general manager at Knockers, a one-unit beach-themed operation that opened in 1986.

Nevertheless, several answer candidly when pressed about the wisdom of dressing attractive women servers in skimpy clothing. "The bottom line is, good-looking women bring in business," said VanNess of Zoomerz.

Laney said that even though Knockers' servers are females dressed in cutoff shorts, the restaurant caters heavily to families. Knockers installed free video games for children under a certain age who are dining with parents. The menu includes home-cooked meals and Cajun sandwiches as well as wings and burgers.

Hooters' menu meanwhile consists of popular signature sandwiches, like the Grouper's Cousin, the Ultimate Grilled Ham & Cheese and the Hooter Burger, all at $4.95, plus salads, steamed shrimp, clams and crab legs, Carolina-style roated oysters -- and its "nearly world famous" Hooters chicken wings.

Mugs 'n Jugs is a 3-year-old Hooters-style concept that moved to a full-bar concept soon after it opened. But the effervescent young female servers at the one-unit, 150-seat operation continue to dress themselves in stockings, shorts and T-shirts.

"Mugs 'n Jugs was like Hooters in the beginning, but it's been modified," said general manager Mike Coluzzi, himself a former Hooters line cook.

Although Hooters knockoffs are springing up as far afield as Scotland and Germany -- and although the company aggressively protects its trademarked name -- the operators are learning to accept the foodservice industry as a world of imitation.