HOMEGROWN HITS

These restaurants have Dallas roots, and now they’re sprouting all over the map.

TIN STAR tinstartacobar.com

FIRST RESTAURANT Uptown Dallas, 1999 TOTAL RESTAURANTS 11

IN OUR NEIGHBORHOOD Preston Center; NorthPark Center area, and several stores around Waco and Cleburne. Most recently we opened our northernmost store in Burleson, which was a natural progression of growth for us — 15 miles away from one of our existing stores in Cleburne that has a lot of traffic, and we need to relieve that store, and Burleson is a burgeoning community with lots of young families. We’re very proud of Central Market stores in Dallas-Fort Worth area. They’re serving customers well, and it’s working very well for us. We’ll continue to use that format.”

COMPANY PHILOSOPHY It started as a taco bar with a Southwestern flair and later developed its popular cheeseburger tacos and other signature tacos based on guests’ suggestions — “here’s what I like, here’s what my mom used to make, or here’s this crazy idea I have, and we’d be like, OK, let’s do it,” president and owner Mike Rangel says.

EXPANSION PLANS Rangel likes highly dense traffic patterns during the day and “a lot of rooftops around at night.” The company also likes to be close to hospital districts to attract “patients going there, people who work there and pharmaceutical reps.” Also, because Tin Star is popular with the 25-45 crowd, “apartment complexes and condos are good,” Rangel says. The company is looking to open six new locations in 2011, including Denton, Fort Worth, Arlington and near Northwest Highway and Greenville.

—LESLIE SWEET, HEB DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS

EXPERT OPINION

“Anybody that knows H-E-B loves them and wishes they were here. They’re what Tom Thumb was to Dallas 20 years ago. They’re a family business, and they’ll adapt a store to the area around it. H-E-B has pretty strong coverage throughout the state. You think, OK, Dallas has to happen. On the other hand, they’re thinking let’s be cautious. I think they’re always thinking what’s the trigger that will cause them to address Dallas.”

—MIKE GEISLER

“The move to the DFW market is inevitable. It’s just a matter of timing for those guys.”

—DAVIDSHELTON