About 10 years ago Nashville was dubbed “It City.”
And about 10 years ago, Nashville popped up on global restaurant brand Fogo de Chão’s radar.
“It’s been almost 10 years that Nashville has been on our radar. We’ve always felt like Nashville was [a good market] because it’s the capital of country music. It’s a magnet. Nashville is like Fogo, it’s bigger than you think. Every time someone hears a country song in Ireland or South America, it ties back to Nashville. So we’ve always had Nashville on our map.” Barry McGowan, CEO of Fogo de Chão, told the Business Journal.
Fogo de Chão announced it was headed for downtown Music City’s Nashville Yards development in November, eyeing a 2025 opening. A churrasco grill takes center stage in the dining room and a market table, inspired by the kitchen tables of Brazilian farms, will offer salads, superfoods, fresh vegetables, cured meats, cheeses and antipasti.
Founded in Southern Brazil in 1979, Fogo de Chão became known for its use of churrasco, an old-world cooking style using an open flame to roast high-quality meats. The brand now boasts over 60 locations and counting across the U.S., Puerto Rico, Brazil, Ecuador, Mexico and the Middle East. In 2023, Fogo de Chão signed 22 leases, both domestically and internationally.
The Business Journal spoke with McGowan to learn more about the international brand’s interest in Music City.
Answers have been edited for length and clarity.
Do you view Nashville as a global city?
It’s an international city. It’s on everyone’s map. If you get to America, that’s a place you want to go. … The linchpin of music is global, it transcends no matter what language you speak, if your song on the radio and you see it or people think about America, Nashville is a very big part of the repertoire.
Why has Nashville been on your radar for so long?
Nashville has international restaurants, it has international appeal. I’d say people think endearingly about Nashville, because the music from Nashville touches everybody’s soul. It transcends culture and language so through music, there’s a connection. It doesn’t surprise me the food scene has blown up, because of music; it starts with music and your passion around that. … We will add value to the portfolio of incredible operators and incredible food scene and obviously being near a music venue is important to me because I love music.
What characteristics does a city have to have for you to expand to it?
We are in 30 cities in America today; we’re building out a brand, so I’d say we build one restaurant at a time and we want to be in the heart of every community. Opening a restaurant is easy, building a brand for the long term is about finding your place and where you fit in long term. We look for cities that have key drivers and one that is growing. Second, that it’s got a family foundation. I call a regenerative foundation, meaning people have families or they leave as a family and they come back to it. A regenerative nature goes back to the health of the city and the passion for their city. That’s where we want to be. … Our demographic is unique; we are not a steakhouse. In terms of demographics, we are the opposite. We are 87% millennial, Gen Z, Gen X. We are 42% female; we have a family component over 20%, and we are more ethnically diverse than most restaurants. … We like to find communities with a growing demographic, and everything about that development [Nashville Yards] — the lifestyle, the deployment that’s happening there, the housing and all the surrounding areas — just fits our demographics beautifully.
Why was Nashville Yards the perfect location in Music City?
It’s the developer himself [Southwest Value Partners]. It’s a very thoughtful design, very purposeful about the co-tenancy and their expectation of the standards they want to uphold so all of that in combination attracts the right long term investments and the right long term co-tenants. Nashville Yards is a top-tier development, and it’s a very strong property in Nashville. … It offers an alternative to the music and entertainment to a city that has a lot of it already. It’s a different experience, more modernized, new technology where you can work, eat, play and enjoy versus having to leave to go to the entertainment. I think it gravitates all of that. … It will be a different gravity point that will add more energy to the city overall.
What do you think Fogo de Chão will add to Nashville’s restaurant scene and what do you hope it becomes known as in the community?
Warmth, genuine, authentic hospitality. Hospitality in our industry has been waning. It’s busy, a lot of competition. A lot of people are understaffed. We are going to lean into great hospitality and again everything we do is about making sure each guests has the experience they desire. Everybody dines differently today, the idea of hospitality in a very vibrant, beautiful designed place with menus and optionality to drive occasions for the guests at the price point they want to be at. We sell sliders for $2 to $4 each, to a $165 wagyu dry aged steak to anything in between. It’s how you’d like to dine and that experience is just easy, enjoyable, based off an authentic centuries old culinary art form called churrasco. That’s the differentiation, that’s the real craving of the brand.
Read the full story from Nashville Business Journal here.