Staks Pancake Kitchen is about to have a new home outside the Mid-South. Ten new homes, in fact.
Owner Brice Bailey recently announced plans to franchise the Staks brand at 10 new locations through his LLC, The Bailey Group, in partnership with Lynda Sanford, CEO of Atlanta-based Classics Dining and Hospitality group.
“We’ve been working on this for 11 months now, and signed a Franchise Disclosure Document back in June,” Bailey says. “Lynda came to us with a good plan, and we really like the market. She’s done a great job of identifying locations across the state of Georgia, but mainly in the greater Atlanta area.” There have been approaches for franchises in other states as well, but Bailey doesn’t want to rush the process. So for now, the focus remains on Atlanta.
The expansion comes as an added boost for Staks, which bucked the trend and saw increased sales during most of 2020 and 2021. That leaves Bailey confident that the new restaurants can make a big impact beyond the comforts of home.
“We’re a breakfast and lunch place, but I think our uniqueness really helps,” he says. “We’ve got some menu items that are really creative and have become favorites here. For example, our Bomb Melts are made from bomboloni bread, which is used to make Italian donuts. I haven’t seen that anywhere else. It’s just a lot of items you won’t see at your typical upscale breakfast and lunch places.”
Many of the familiar favorites will remain constant from franchise to franchise, but Bailey wants each new Staks to be a reflection of its environment. He and other leadership at the Bailey Group will urge new owners to add some of their own ideas, all while incorporating ingredients sourced from farms local to the restaurants’ respective areas. “It should feel like a hometown store in whatever market we go into,” he explains.
Bluff City breakfast lovers need not worry — in coming up with new creative items, Staks isn’t turning its back on its two Memphis locations. “We’ve been workshopping a few new things here,” says Clint Kelso, COO of the Bailey Group and general manager at Staks’ Germantown location. “We’ll have stuffed French toast made with that same bomboloni bread. It’s stuffed with cream cheese, covered with a blueberry glaze, and topped with fresh blueberries and strawberries.
“We’re also adding a breakfast Reuben sandwich. The bread is French toast, and it will have cinnamon sugar sauerkraut instead of a traditional thousand island dressing.”
One new item that Bailey is particularly interested in is a barbecue hash recipe. “It’s like a hash-brown from the skillet,” he says, with ham, pulled pork, sausage, and Staks’ own jerk sauce.
But the most exciting development for pancake lovers is proposed additions to an already robust selection of “Sophisticated Staks,” the restaurant’s list of inventive takes on pancakes. Bailey says that pancakes and French toast sales soared during the pandemic. Coupled with plenty of extra time in the kitchen, the team has plenty of ideas.
“We’re definitely going to expand on those menus,” says Bailey. “So if you want to switch it up with something like cinnamon roll French toast, things like that, we’ll be able to accommodate you.”
The Bailey Group plans to be hands-on with all the upcoming Staks locations (including a third local branch in Southaven slated to open within the next six weeks), and has training all planned out. “It’s too early to tell when the first Atlanta location will open,” Kelso says, “but Lynda has plans to open two to three new locations per year.”
