The home of the former Macaroni Grill will soon be home to Rex's Bar & Grill.
Restaurateur Rex Benson is cornering the market on South University Drive.
Benson, owner and steward of the Ol’ South Pancake House, is angling for a late summer or early fall opening of Rex’s Bar & Grill, located in the former home of Romano’s Macaroni Grill, next door to the location of the iconic brand begun by his father in 1962.
Rex’s will be family friendly and feature a menu crafted by notable local chef that Benson was not at liberty to unveil at the time of our conversation on Friday afternoon, but “people definitely know him.” The restaurant will utilize Romano’s pizza oven, that’s a definite, Benson says.
“I've always loved that building and thought that it would be a really cool, unique place to do something,” Benson says.
Robert Romano of Hub City Productions in Dallas is the architect of record in the redesign of the 7,200-square-foot building. Benson says he’s also adding a deck out back that will seat in the neighborhood of 250.
Estimated cost of the finish out is just north of $900,000, according to documents filed with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation.
Benson will act as his own general contractor … “for now,” he adds cautiously.
Work is scheduled to begin April 8 and be complete by the middle of June.
Televisions naturally will be a significant feature. A big scoreboard will be the centerpiece of the main part of the dining room with 360-degree capability as a TV.
“Anywhere and everywhere you’ll be able see it,” he says.
Rooms for private parties will also be available. Rex’s will do live music “at some point,” he adds.
The lot, of course, offers lots of parking.
The building was home to Romano’s Macaroni Grill from 1995 until its closing last year, an unfortunate circumstance, to be sure, but a fortuitous bounce in Benson’s aspiration to do a concept like this.
“The landlord and I were talking seven or eight months ago,” Benson says. “I was like, ‘I love that building.’ He goes, ‘Yeah, well, you never know.’ And literally like a week later, he goes, ‘You're not gonna believe this, but I just got a letter saying that they're done.’
“So we decided to jump on it.”
Benson was a Fort Worth Inc. Entrepreneur of Excellence finalist in 2022.
He took over the fabled restaurant his father David Benson and aunt Bette Brozgoldin opened in 1962. The Ol’ South Pancake House turns 62 this year and is stronger than ever, pandemic shutdowns be damned.
Since 2011, when Benson took on operations, Ol’ South witnessed sales growth of 67% in the following 10 years, thanks to technology — point-of-sale, instead of pen and paper — new trends, and new menu items.
He expanded into Burleson in January 2021, the first of what Benson envisions as Ol’ South restaurants dotting GPS devices across North Texas in the years to come.
“Going from 8,000 guests a week to zero was like running full speed into a brick wall,” Benson said 18 months ago.
The concept of a bar and grill has been something on the forefront of Benson’s mind, he says.
In a way, it’s stepping out of the giant shadows of his restaurateur forebears.
“My father started the Old South Pancake House in 1962 and that was his creation and that was his idea and that was his world, and I'll honor it until the day I die,” Benson says. “But this is a new concept and something completely different that I wanted to bring.”
