Four well-known area dining spots are experiencing the passing of the baton this week from one Naples-based restaurant group to another. The local dining concepts of Chops City Grill, Pazzo! Italian Cafe and Yabba Island Grill are now part of Phelan Family Brands’ portfolio of restaurants.  

The sale of the four longtime restaurants from Culinary Concepts of Naples closed Tuesday. Terms of the private sale were not disclosed. After being a major player in the local restaurant scene for decades, Skip Quillen retired his Culinary Concepts company after the sale.  

“Although I wish I could continue working forever, I felt like now was the time to give someone else a chance,” Quillen said. “I truly feel that Grant (Phelan) and his company are the best to take command of the ship and chart their own course. I will miss my friends, who I love dearly, that run Culinary Concepts, but I leave knowing that they are in good hands, and with bright futures.”  

Grant Phelan, CEO of Phelan Family Brands, paid homage this week to Quillen and his popular restaurants.  

“Skip was really a pioneer and I’m honored to continue on his legacy in these three restaurants on Fifth Avenue, and then Chops of Bonita because I really think he did a great job,” Phelan said.   

Phelan Family Brands notably celebrates its 25th anniversary this year. “So, that’s why this purchase is a big deal to us,” Phelan said. “This gives us 25 operating restaurants. And that is unique for us because we opened (the original Pinchers in Bonita Springs) in 1997. We opened 25 years ago. So, it’s 25 in 25.”   

In addition to the four newly acquired restaurants, Phelan has 11 locations of Pinchers, four spots for Deep Lagoon Seafood, two restaurants for Texas Tony’s, as well as The Bay House, Two Fillets, CJ’s on the Bay and Phuzzy’s Boat Shack. They also hope to relaunch the Pinchers that was demolished by Hurricane Ian last year on Fort Myers Beach.  

As for the new acquisitions, Phelan plans to grow the Chops brand to additional locations, breathe new life into Pazzo’s and eventually create a new concept at Yabba.   

“We’re really excited about the opportunities,” Phelan said. “I love Chops. I think Chops is a phenomenal brand. Puts us in a new category. Puts us in the upper-end steak place or a steakhouse category. I think Chops needs to be throughout Southwest Florida. I can see a location in Fort Myers and Cape Coral, on Lakewood Ranch very soon, hopefully. We’ll see.”  

Phelan also is excited about acquiring Yabba, which he said its Fifth Avenue location next to Sugden Community Theatre is the greatest restaurant location in Naples. He eventually plans to transform Yabba into Phelan’s Fifth Ave restaurant. “It’s going to be our flagship restaurant,” he said. “The bones of the restaurant are incredible — that inside-outside bar — although I’m going to completely remodel that restaurant.” 

Phelan plans only minor tweaks now to Yabba, which will continue to operate as is with some minor interior changes. To create the new concept — Phelan’s Fifth Ave — Phelan plans to invest a lot of time and money in the Yabba space to completely redo it. “That’s probably a year and a half to two years away,” he said. “For now, it’ll continue operating as Yabba’s.”

Likewise for Pazzo on Fifth Avenue South. Phelan said he plans to touch up the interior and breathe a little new life into it by putting the Phelan touch on it.

“I had my senior graduation dinner at Pazzo’s,” he said. “I was graduating from Barron (Collier High School) in 1995 and I remember that. Since then, the menu has changed a little bit. I’m going to look at the menu and probably bring it back to what it was originally, and then really pushing to focus on service and getting involved in the community and Fifth Avenue.”

Despite planning some changes, Phelan is complimentary about Quillen’s continual efforts to upgrade his restaurants and maintain a high level of excellence over the years.

“His interiors are great. His kitchens are spotless, and he’s got a great team,” Phelan said. “He really has some super talented people that work with him. And so I’m looking to learn from those people as much as I’m going to teach them. He was a chef-driven concept and I’ve always thought his food was really good. And so, he’s got about five or six different chefs that I’m going to be working with on an everyday basis and I think it’s going to improve some of the aspects of other restaurants that I have.”

Meanwhile, Quillen, 65, has earned his retirement from a tough business experiencing some tough times. He just closed a fifth Culinary Concepts restaurant – The Saloon at Coconut Point – at the end of April. It certainly wasn’t an easy decision to let go of his entire company.

Skip Quillen

“This is a very bittersweet goodbye for me as I exit the stage and retire after almost 30 years in the restaurant industry. I will miss my team and friends at Culinary Concepts, several who have worked with me for more than 20 years,” Quillen said in an emailed statement.

“How lucky was I to fulfill my dream to not only open my own restaurant, but open five restaurants and do it all in Southwest Florida, the most beautiful and friendliest place on earth? It has been my supreme honor to work with the greatest team on earth at Culinary Concepts throughout every facet of my professional career and in my day-to-day life. It has been a joy to work with the best employees, incredible customers, loyal purveyors, lawyers, repairmen and competitors. Thank you all.”

Quillen also extended his best wishes to the team at Phelan Family Brands. “I have zero doubt that they will be successful,” he said.

The Phelans, of course, aren’t stopping at 25.

“I do have another big Deep Lagoon under construction. It’s actually a 12,000-square-foot Deep Lagoon up at Waterside in Lakewood Ranch. So, that’ll be open in summer of next year,” Phelan said.” And then we just began rebuilding Fish-Tail restaurant in Fish-Tail Marina on the south end of Fort Myers Beach. So, that should be coming in the next year, as well. We just began the process of getting that rebuilt. It took about 9 feet of water in it. So, it’s been closed since the hurricane, but we are going to bring that one back.”