SPOTLIGHT
Tampa-based 23 Restaurant Services is the company that successfully turned the Ford Motor Co.’s brand into Ford’s Garage, a popular and growing car-themed restaurant chain with 21 locations scattered around Florida, from Panama City to Fort Lauderdale. Now it’s teaming up with another iconic brand: the late golfing legend and philanthropist Arnold Palmer.
The company signed a licensing deal with Arnold Palmer Enterprises to launch a dining and entertainment concept — an “eatertainment” concept — called Arnold Palmer’s CenterCup. It’ll be a restaurant attached to a covered outdoor activity area featuring three nine-hole mini golf courses. Inside there’ll be golf simulators and billiards. The first location is to open in Gainesville next year, with others to follow in Jacksonville and Panama City.
“This concept is going to be pretty unique. There’s really nothing like this in Gainesville,” says Lisa Longest, the company’s marketing director. The aim is for the restaurant, which is to be called Palmer’s, to stand on its own, attracting diners who don’t even necessarily want to golf. Longest compared the restaurant to Houston’s, a higher-end casual dining place.
“Our vision is to be the trusted hospitality champion for iconic brands,” she said. The company also has been launching other restaurant concepts, including Tiki Docks in St. Petersburg and Riverview; Don the Beachcomber in Madeira Beach; and Yeoman’s Topgolf Swing Suite in Tampa and Kissimmee.
CONSTRUCTION
- Heatherwood Construction has broken ground on the Cabana Resort & Spa, a 20-acre development of luxury condos and amenities planned for Bonita Springs. The project will feature a water park, event spaces, a neighborhood park and a seven-story building with 110 condos. Construction was delayed by Hurricane Ian in 2022, regulatory setbacks and relocation of the state-listed gopher tortoise.
- Tampa General Hospital has broken ground on a 13-story surgical tower alongside its Davis Islands campus. The building will be named after the Taneja Family Foundation that donated $25 million toward the project, the latest gift of $120 million raised so far. The 565,000-sq.-ft. tower will house the hospital’s surgical, neuroscience and transplant services upon completion in 2027.
DEVELOPMENT
- Arizona-based homebuilder Taylor Morrison is planning to build a 960-home community in the East Palmetto area of northern Manatee County. That’s in addition to the 1,000 single-family homes and 300 townhouses that the developer is planning nearby in Parrish. Home sales for the East Palmetto community are slated to begin in mid-2025.
HIGHER EDUCATION
- The State Board of Education has approved three new bachelor’s degrees for St. Petersburg College: cardiopulmonary sciences, digital media and English education for middle and high school students. Each of the programs will launch this fall except for the digital media degree, which will become available next year.
HOSPITALITY
- The long-awaited Palmetto Marriott Resort & Spa has had its grand opening. The eight-story, 252-room resort is connected to the Bradenton Area Convention Center, which is undergoing a $48-million renovation and expansion of its own. Once that’s complete, the resort and convention center together will have 140,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor meeting and event space.
HOUSING
- Residents have started moving into 99 tiny homes constructed in East Tampa that will serve as transitional housing for people experiencing homelessness. Each 64-sq.-ft. cottage includes a foldout bed, air conditioning, heating and power outlets. The city of Tampa contributed $750,000 to the project, which is run by the homeless shelter Tampa Hope.
SPORTS BUSINESS
- The University of South Florida has chosen three companies to build its new on-campus football stadium. One is Manhattan Construction Co., which helped build AT&T Stadium in Dallas and also renovated Raymond James Stadium. The other two are DuCon, which has done work at the Ringling College of Art and Design, and H.J. Russell & Co. of Atlanta, one of the largest Black-owned construction firms in the country. The $340-million, 35,000-seat stadium is expected to open in 2027.
- The city of Winter Haven has unveiled its plans to redevelop the Chain of Lakes Park into a $20-million facility for amateur and collegiate baseball. The park was previously used by major league baseball teams like the Boston Red Sox and Cleveland Indians for spring training. The redevelopment will bring four collegiate-level artificial turf baseball fields, batting cages, fan areas and more to the park while preserving historic elements. It’s expected to open by February.
TRANSPORTATION
- After six years of construction and several delays, the Gateway Express project has opened to the public. The $600-million project connects Interstate 275 to several major roadways in the Tampa Bay area via raised four-lane toll roads. New express lanes will also help disperse the region’s traffic.
WORKFORCE
- FedEx is permanently closing two shipping centers in Naples, one in Punta Gorda and one in Fort Myers. Eight managers and 220 couriers will be laid off in the process. The changes come as the company reduces costs by $4 billion by 2025 and an additional $2 billion by 2027.
BUSINESS
- Systal Technology Solutions — a Scotland-based IT company managing network, cloud and cybersecurity services — is opening a network operations center in Tampa’s One Metro Centre building. It will be the company’s U.S. headquarters.
IN MEMORIAM
“Being the CEO of a big, global company is a consuming, very intense commitment. Most people don’t want to do it their entire lives.”
— Bob Dutkowsky, the former CEO and executive chairman of Tech Data (now TD Synnex), in a 2016 interview with FLORIDA TREND. Dutkowsky took the reins of the Clearwater-based technology distributor in 2006 and grew it to be the largest company in Florida. He died unexpectedly in May at the age of 69.