Counsel to Counsel - September 2008 - (Page 19) The Secret to Longevity Columbia Restaurant Group and Fowler White Boggs Banker By Steven Andersen A ccording to a 2003 Ohio State University study, 59 percent of restaurants go under within their first three years. In 1991, professors from Michigan State and Cornell University found that 70 percent of restaurants never see their 10th anniversary. But there’s apparently no research out there on the odds of a restaurant making it to the century mark. So if you really want to know the secret to longevity in a notoriously short-lived business, you’ll have to ask Richard Gonzmart. “It’s about passion for what you do,” he explains. “It has a lot to do with being loyal, staying committed to your goals and, through good times and bad, you stick with each other.” new legal issue to tend to, because the nature of the business involves a lot of personnel, a lot of corporate structures. It’s the oldest, largest restaurant in Florida.” Risk and Reward Columbia’s story traces the arc of Tampa itself, and its historic Latin Quarter, Ybor City. It started as a corner café in Ybor City for the cigar rollers who had immigrated from Cuba, Shannon explains. It has grown organically, room by room to the point where today it occupies a full city block. Photography by Dutertre2 In recent decades the company opened five Jeffrey C. Shannon (left), Fowler White Boggs Banker; additional Columbia Richard Gonzmart, Columbia Restaurant Group restaurants around Florida, including a more casual dining Gonzmart is president of Columbia “Fowler White has been working with us location in Sarasota, and a new café in Restaurant Group, whose Tampa flagship since 1958,” he says. “I met recently with the Tampa Bay History Museum. But the was founded by his great-grandfather over Jack Boggs, who has helped us with estate sprawling Ybor City original remains the 100 years ago. With his two daughters, planning for four generations. His first heart of the business—and the family. a niece and other family members now involved in the company, the family business account was my grandfather.” Although the official history has it that is now in its fifth generation. What began as a simple estate-planning Gonzmart’s maternal great-grandfather, account grew to a full-service relationship, Casimiro Hernandez Sr., opened the “We’ve been blessed to work with a lot of including employment matters, corporate, Columbia Restaurant Café in 1905, family businesses,” Gonzmart continues. real estate, permitting and immigration. Gonzmart learned while doing research “Our dairy company has been serving us for the 100-year anniversary that the café for 96 years. Our bread company has been “We’ve seen the family evolve,” says Jeffrey actually opened its doors on Dec. 17, 1903. selling to us for 93 years.” C. Shannon, a Fowler White partner who has worked with Columbia for more than 25 “Actually, it didn’t even have a door; the And Columbia Restaurant Group’s law firm, years. “We’ve gotten to know the children place was open 24 hours a day,” he laughs. Fowler White Boggs Banker, has been with and the grandchildren. There’s always some them for half a century. www.martindale.com/c2c SEptEmbEr 2008 profiles in partnership 19 http://www.martindale.com/c2c
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