(FORTUNE Small Business) – TOTAL ENTERTAIN. No. 9

Restaurant chains have wrung every drop of novelty out of the English pub, sports bar, and casual-dining concepts. So Total Entertainment Restaurant Corp., based in Wichita, has taken the counterintuitive next step: combining them all under one roof and selling it as "The Best Cocktail Party in Town, Seven Days a Week." (Yes, the phrase is trademarked.) If that doesn't strike you as a winning idea, don't become a restaurant entrepreneur. Sales at Total Entertainment were up 60% in 2002, to $102.5 million, at a time when most consumers weren't feeling particularly flush.

The company owns a chain of 57 restaurants, mostly under the Fox and Hound brand, and all with a wings-and-burgers menu and a décor of burgundy and hunter green. Think of it as English-pub-meets-TGI-Friday's. That might not seem a revolutionary idea, but the company adds some details to broaden the restaurants' appeal. For example, each location typically has more than 35 televisions, including a handful of big screens. But rather than show an unrelenting stream of sports, the managers mix in rock videos and other fare to appeal to women and music buffs. Instead of parking a pockmarked dartboard and a scruffy pool table in a dark corner, every Fox and Hound has two game rooms flanking the central bar and restaurant area, with six to ten pool tables in each, plus shuffleboard and video golf. The bathrooms all get fresh flowers, and the company antes up for flattering lighting and $50,000 to $75,000 air-filtration systems, so your clothes won't pollute your closet after cocktails. "We try to make it very upscale and female-friendly," says CEO Steve Johnson. "We don't want to be pigeonholed."

That strategy pays off with rotating shifts of customers. In addition to a reliable happy-hour crowd, the restaurants become a local gathering spot from seven to 11 at night, thanks to the games and TV screens. Then, unlike most chains, the Fox and Hound stays open until 2 A.M., provided local laws allow. "We cater to employees of nearby restaurants who get off work at ten or 11," explains Johnson.

Total Entertainment has been around only since 1997, so its managers are still figuring out how and where the concept works best. As they've gotten better at picking promising locations and staging launches, Johnson says, they're finding that new units generate 35% to 40% higher sales than old ones. And while most stores have typically been in shopping centers, four new freestanding units are producing sales 60% higher than the mall versions. As a result, at least six of the company's ten to 12 new stores this year will also stand alone.

Total Entertainment's big challenge, like every successful chain's before it, is to open a steady stream of new units while expertly running the ones already open. But the managers' pedigree and early history almost guarantee that they're up to the job. The chain was founded in 1997 by Jamie Coulter, chairman of Lone Star Steakhouse, with three of his Lone Star associates who later became top officers of Total Entertainment. After purchasing three Fox and Hound English Pub & Grille restaurants from Steve Hartnett, a restaurant entrepreneur who lives in Dallas, and eight Bailey's Sports Grills from Dennis Thompson, who first founded Lone Star Steakhouse, the group combined the two restaurant concepts under the Fox and Hound name. Coulter resigned in late 1998 to focus on Lone Star but still owns 15% of the company. And Hartnett, the original pioneer of the Fox and Hound idea, still serves as co-chairman.

Of course, there were some bumps along the way. The company ran into trouble in 1999 after adding 24 new locations in just over a year. Field managers, who normally oversee five to seven restaurants, were swamped with ten or more, and food quality and cleanliness suffered. But after freezing its expansion and fixing the basics, the company resumed its growth in late 2000. This year, first-quarter earnings jumped 21.2%, but the crucial measure of success--same-store sales--dipped, breaking a streak of 15 consecutive quarters of growth. We're betting that stumble, related to bad weather and the war with Iraq, won't even be noticeable a year from now. After all, if you throw the best cocktail party in town, people tend to take note.