BEER RESTAURANTS: Taco Mac ahead of time

Bob Campbell, president of Atlanta-based Tappan Street Restaurant Group, has learned to be careful with the changes his company makes to its Taco Mac restaurants.

Taco Mac managers decided a few years ago to fix the storefront clock at the original Virginia-Highland location. It had been stuck at 7 for years.

“We got all kinds of phone calls and e-mails from people saying, ‘As long as I’ve been going to Taco Mac in Virginia-Highland, it’s always been 7 o’clock’,” Campbell said. “We fixed it for like a day.”

As Taco Mac grows, Campbell and Tappan walk a line between preserving an Atlanta fixture and opening some of the area’s most modern sports restaurants and bars.

Started in 1979 as a dive bar and wings restaurant, Taco Mac has expanded to become a major player in the Atlanta casual dining market. Taco Mac has added sites this year in Cumming, Midtown and Philips Arena to bring the chain to 22 restaurants overall.

It has three more restaurants planned in 2009. Taco Macs are expected to open in Canton, The Prado in Sandy Springs and Charlotte. The parent company also will open a new concept in Brookhaven called Deckard’s, a slightly more upscale restaurant.

In many ways, Taco Mac has grown up and out with Atlanta, said Harold Shumacher, a local restaurant real-estate broker and president of the Shumacher Group.

College-age residents became familiar with the original site in the 1980s, Shumacher said. As this first wave of customers got older, they moved to the suburbs and Taco Mac followed them, he said.

Taco Mac is becoming more polished as it opens new restaurants, Shumacher said. The Midtown location has a modern interior design inspired by a cascading glass of Guinness beer.

“They have taken their stores up not just a notch but several notches,” Shumacher said. “These are slick, state-of-the-art, very contemporary, thoughtfully built-out facilities. They don’t have a grubby pub look.”

Taco Mac, though, could soon run out of room to grow in Atlanta, Shumacher said. The challenge is transferring its brand to new markets, he said.

Taco Mac’s only location outside of metro Atlanta is in Chattanooga. People in places such as Nashville, Charlotte and Orlando might mistake it for a Mexican restaurant at first glance, Shumacher said. “The challenge there is name-brand recognition,” he said.

Taco Mac has dealt with a misunderstood identity since it was started in 1979, said Campbell, president of Taco Mac’s parent company.

The chain goes by Taco Mac, even though Buffalo wings are the main attraction, because the founders started the restaurant at the site of a former taco shack. They decided to spend money to renovate the kitchen instead of buying a new sign.

Customers wouldn’t stand for a different name now, Campbell said. “We’ll never change the name,” he said.

Taco Mac, though, has altered its strategy in some key areas, Campbell said.

It added draft beer after managers visited a tavern in California in the early 1990s that featured a wide selection of beer on tap. The move also coincided with the rise in popularity of craft beer.

It added more TVs after noticing big crowds during the Braves’ worst-to-first playoff run in 1991.

Taco Mac is expanding with a clearer vision of the brand, Campbell said. Every new restaurant has about 100 beer taps and a dizzying array of flat-panel televisions.

The chain also is using its size in metro Atlanta to increase its credibility with beer geeks, said Fred Crudder, Tappan Street’s beverage director.

Taco Mac has negotiated exclusive releases of some craft beers as they enter the Atlanta market. The events have drawn traffic on normally slow nights, Crudder said.

It’s also landed special limited-run kegs. Taco Mac is working with three Atlanta brewers on special beers to celebrate its 30th anniversary next year.

Taco Mac still has the mainstream beers, but it wants to continue building a reputation with beer lovers, Crudder said.

“We don’t want to ever be exclusive of anyone,” Crudder said. “We have the space and capacity and the clientele to be very inclusive in our beer selection.”

In addition to the beer, Taco Mac has upgraded the menu to give customers better options outside of its wings, said Matthew Deckard, Tappan Street’s corporate chef. Wings are still the biggest item, accounting for about a quarter of food sales, he said.

But Taco Mac has added more healthy items, such as salads, and started seasonal changes to the menu, Deckard said. It’s also tried to bring a consistency to items across all restaurants.

“I think food, at the time when I came in, wasn’t at the forefront,” said Deckard, who joined Taco Mac in 2005. “Beer was the strong point. Now, food is starting to evolve more.”

Taco Mac’s new growth is coming as a U.S. slowdown and higher commodity costs threaten the overall restaurant industry. Taco Mac’s same-store sales, though, are expected to be up this year, Campbell said.

During the last major slowdown in 2000 and 2001, Taco Mac lagged the industry, Campbell said. Sales stayed strong through the downturn but slowed as the economy bounced back, he said.

Patrons may have turned to Taco Mac as an affordable option in the downturn and returned to some higher-end restaurants once the outlook improved, Campbell said.

Tappan Street is closely watching the Charlotte economy, Campbell said. Charlotte is a major hub for banking, which has been hit by financial crisis, he said.

Taco Mac, though, feels confident about its expansion plans, Campbell said. “Right now, nobody is putting a hold on us,” he said. “We’re dragging our feet a little bit on Charlotte just to see what happens up there with the banking.”

DID YOU KNOW?

> More and more: Taco Mac, which opened its first site in 1979, has 22 sites in metro Atlanta and Chattanooga.

> What’s in a name? The chain, best-known for Buffalo wings, is called Taco Mac because the first outlet was opened in a former Mexican restaurant. The founders decided not to spend the money needed to change the sign. Instead, they renovated the kitchen.

> Most taps: Taco Mac tries to have about 100 taps when it opens a new restaurant. The Midtown location has the most taps at 140.

> Busiest day: The Philips Arena site recorded the most sales ever for a single Taco Mac location Aug. 30, the day of the Chick-fil-A College Kickoff between Alabama and Clemson at the Georgia Dome next door.

> Wings and ‘Weck: Buffalo wings account for about 25 percent of Taco Mac’s food sales. It’s also recently added another Buffalo-area specialty, a Beef on ‘Weck sandwich, which is served only on Wednesdays.