A family franchise group led by 23-year-old Ohm Patel has signed a three-unit area development agreement to bring The Brass Tap to Middle Tennessee — the upscale American tavern brand's first footprint in the state. Partners Chan Patel, Sanjay Patel and Shivam Patel round out the ownership group, which plans to open in Brentwood before sequencing into Murfreesboro and Franklin.
The Development Play
The agreement slots into FSC Franchise Co.'s broader suburban growth strategy. FSC, the Tampa-based multi-brand franchisor behind Beef 'O' Brady's and Newk's Eatery in addition to The Brass Tap, operates more than 250 locations across its portfolio. The Brass Tap itself has cleared 50 units in 16 states, and CEO Chris Elliott signaled that franchise signings in underpenetrated markets remain central to the system's development pipeline. "Our development strategy is built on finding the right partners in the right markets, and Ohm and his family are a perfect fit for Middle Tennessee," Elliott said.
Middle Tennessee's suburban corridor — anchored by Brentwood and Franklin along the I-65 spine south of Nashville — has drawn consistent franchise interest over the past several years as population migration from higher-cost metros drives consumer spending into secondary suburban nodes. The craft beer and bar-grill segment has tracked that migration, with entertainment-forward concepts increasingly targeting the daypart gap between fast casual and full-service in those markets.
Operator Background
Ohm Patel, who graduated from Mississippi State University with a degree in kinesiology and business, comes from a hotel and retail management background rooted in his family's two-decade operating history in the United States. Before executing the franchise agreement, the group visited an existing Brass Tap unit in Huntsville, Alabama, and completed Discovery Day at the brand's Tampa headquarters — standard due-diligence steps for multi-unit signings in the FSC system.
Each Tennessee location will carry The Brass Tap's core format: an extensive tap list skewed toward local and regional craft breweries, specialty cocktails, premium wines and a chef-influenced shareable menu. The entertainment programming layer — live music, trivia nights, karaoke, sports watch parties and patio events — is central to the brand's unit economics and repeat-visit model in suburban trade areas.
What It Means for the Segment
The Patel signing illustrates a durable recruitment dynamic in franchise development: second-generation hospitality operators leveraging family capital and operational familiarity to enter food-and-beverage franchising rather than extending into additional hotel or retail units. For The Brass Tap, landing a family group with existing hospitality infrastructure reduces onboarding friction and supports the brand's neighborhood-gathering-place positioning in markets where community ties matter to the guest experience.
Final site selections for all three Tennessee locations remain flexible as the group evaluates specific trade areas, according to the brand. Operators and franchise developers tracking suburban bar-and-grill expansion in the Southeast can follow The Brass Tap's franchise development activity and broader FSC Franchise Co. portfolio moves as the Tennessee buildout progresses.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
