About

Todd SemrauRestaurants, bars and gathering places provide more than just food and beverage.  Every concept, whether ownership is aware of it or not, contains a body of deliverables that reach beyond its obvious and tangible products.  These intangible traits can be just as important to the success or failure of a food and beverage concept as is the menu and customer service.  Identifying a restaurant’s personality, character and the story being told to it’s market base is an important exercise to take on for any new or existing concept.  

Healthy and profitable restaurants are clearly in-touch with “who they are” and “what they offer”.  Urban Eats Consulting Group works with clients in pulling back the layers of a concept to identify the real, authentic products and services that resonate within a target market.  While burgers may be on the menu customers could be coming in for community interaction, convenience or staying away because of lifestyle conflicts.  In fact, some concepts may even be unknowingly selling something different than the intended brand story! 

Given today’s highly competitive food and beverage market restaurant owners need an edge.  Urban Eats Consulting Group provides that “edge” by generating unique & well developed concepts, hip & eclectic interior designs, fresh menu ideation and vibrant brand collateral.   Too much monetary and aesthetic capital is lost building the “status quo” when the exceptional is within reach.

Developers, architects, urban planners and municipalities spend valuable time and resources developing mixed use urban plans.  Restaurants, special event facilities, cafes, and other gathering places figure predominantly in many of these plans.  Because of their intensive infrastructure and code compliance impacts these food and beverage venues must be carefully evaluated during the design phase.  Urban Eats Restaurant Consulting can provide consulting expertise to aid planners, developers & operators in the following ways:

  • Conceptualize, Brand and Design  Original Restaurant & Bar concepts that champion the “feel” and integrity of a community.
  • Feasibility and Impact Studies identifying potential restaurant sites, construction challenges, interior spacing & sizing, infrastructure needs, ideal tenant mix.
  • Brand Auditsthat thoroughly anaylze and adjust all aspects of a restaurant’s brand message for optimal positioning within the target market. 
  • Business Plan Reviewsthat provide informative analysis so that developers can make strategic tenant based decisions.
  • Community Initiatives  that produce an authentic “sense of place” and attract a loyal, long term customer base.
  • Kitchen Designs & Equipment Specification for the educational, hospitality and entertainment food service sectors.
  • Mixed Use & Commercial Development Consulting analyzing impact on development with regards to signage, patio-scapes, waste removal, odor and grease exhaust, noise,parking, pedestrian flows, etc.

 

    Todd Semrau has food service in his blood.  His mother, Izzy Semrau a long-time foodie, was the PR director of the Peasant Group, a renowned restaurant group in Atlanta.  Back in the day, Todd was a single urban professional, working for Rich’s Department Store and living in East Atlanta Village.

    At that time, EAV was a ghost town with not much going on.  Todd decided that what it needed was a pub where people could have a place to congregate and feel like home.  Todd received an Atlanta Authority Development Loan for 50,000 and went to work on the final menu and concept.  Izzy recommended expanding his food service to have more selections. Todd took her advice and his first restaurant was born, The Heaping Bowl and Brew.It was just what the neighborhood needed and spurred the revitalization of the East Atlanta Village to become one of the hot Intown Atlanta neighborhoods.

    Todd got his first taste of how important a restaurant/bar can be in setting the tone for a neighborhood and bringing people to it. He ran Heaping Bowl and Brew for eight years before selling it.Todd went on to create five more successful restaurants in Atlanta and eventually realized he had a knack and vision for developing food and beverage concepts that contributed to positive, long term urban developments.   Since creating his company Todd has consulted with a wide range of commercial developers, restaurant companies, hotel developers and aspiring restauranteurs to be. 

    He brings passion along with expertise to his trade and you can’t go wrong with that. Semrau focuses on how a winning food service concept must be reflective of its surroundings in order for consumers to adopt it and make it their own. When a concept is forced upon a neighborhood nothing real and authentic takes place.  Thus, long term success is harder to achieve.  A concept that is inclusive of the cultures and personalties of the community it serves becomes part of that community’s foundation.