http://money.msn.com/now/post.aspx?post ... 3ce4833a0c
Chain wants to make 'breastaurant' legit
A Texas restaurateur has trademarked the term, hoping to stake a claim on a booming industry.
The owner of Bikinis Sports Bar and Grill thinks the word "breastaurant" has potential, and he has trademarked it through the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Now Doug Guller's company has the exclusive right to use the term.
Guller wants to "take back the derogatory term," writes CultureMap Houston. The Texan wants to turn it from the snicker-inducing insult once lobbed at Hooters into something a chain can be proud of.
Instead of hiding behind the wink-wink, aren't-we-clever names used by such competitors as Twin Peaks, Canz and the pioneering Hooters, Guller is taking a direct route by trademarking the portmanteau. Bikinis is now the only "breastaurant" -- snicker all you want.
These female-focused chain restaurants became surprisingly popular during the recession, while more traditional business, such as Darden Restaurants' (DRI +0.14%) Red Lobster, have struggled. Even as consumers lost jobs and sharply limited their budgets, the likes of Tilted Kilt and Bone Daddy's found a thriving business. Even at the recession's worst, Hooters still brought in almost $1 billion a year in revenue, ABC News reports. But Hooters is losing business to new competition, and sales fell 4% last year.
The formula for all of them is the same: beer, cheap food and waitresses in revealing outfits.
"It's not necessarily salads for women," Drew Neisser of Renegade Marketing Group told ABC News. "It's finding what a 24-year-old or (25-year-old) would consider really fun and a cool place for them to go."
He'll probably make a few bucks in 10 years or so when the term becomes an industry standard.
j/k
