“When I saw this, it had Surcheros, our culture and our heart written all over it.”
– Surcheros CEO and founder Luke Christian
One of the fastest-growing franchisees in the south held a groundbreaking last week for what will be Jones County’s newest restaurant.
The groundbreaking event was held at Landmark Pointe, the future home of Surcheros. The owner of the property, TJ Heath, welcomed attendees to the event. He said Surcheros is one of his favorites, and when they are in Macon, he tries to go there.
He said he made connections one day with Surcheros CEO and founder, Luke Christian, and they started talking.
“I asked him to come to Gray and check out what we are doing. He got in his car and came to check it out by himself,” Heath said.
The speaker said they walked the whole site, and Christian told him about himself and his story.
“He started from the ground up,” Heath said.
After about an hour, he asked Christian what he thought.
“He said ‘I love it and want to be here,’” the property owner recalled.
Heath said Christian told him he likes small towns, which was where he grew up, and even mentioned that his nephew might be the perfect person to run a Gray restaurant.
He said Christian told him his nephew has ties in Jones County and would be here.
“So we’ll have another young business person here running the business,” Heath added.
The speaker said Surcheros is a good fit because it is not so big and corporate.
“Those work in certain places, and we may end up with some of that. But this is something exactly what we want here,” he said.
Heath concluded his remarks by stating his appreciation for everybody’s support.
Jones County/Gray Chamber of Commerce Director Hailey Robinson was the next to speak. She thanked Heath and Surcheros for including the Chamber and welcomed the new business to the community.
“This fits Gray and Jones County perfectly and speaks to the close-knit community we are,” she said.
Robinson closed by introducing Christian.
The CEO and founder said he is originally from Douglas and Coffee County. He said he was actually from the smaller town of Broxton.
“I grew up farming and ended up in the restaurant business. We started in Douglas, Waycross and Tifton, then kind of kept growing,” he said.
Christian said his family now lives in North Atlanta, but he still has passion for small towns like Gray.
“When I saw this, it had Surcheros, our culture and our heart written all over it,” he said.
The CEO said he mentioned his nephew Wade, who would be running the new restaurant, to Heath. He said Wade had worked for him for eight years and came up through the ranks in the business.
“He’s running the Dublin location now. The numbers speak for themselves on the turnaround he did,” Christian said.
He went on to say the Lord works in mysterious ways.
“I didn’t know he was going to get a fiancé from Gray,” he added.
Christian said Surcheros is a chain and will open its 30th restaurant in Cartersville in May.
“But we still hold on to our heart, our core and what got us there. It’s important to have someone local running this,” he said.” We are proud to be here and proud of the reception and the excitement on Facebook.”
Christian said people in larger markets do not seem to care when a new business opens.
“They’ve got everything, but here it means something. We want to value that, serve you the best we can and build something you can be proud of,” he said.
The CEO introduced his nephew, Wade Christian, who will run Gray’s Surcheros.
“I am excited to be here and to represent Gray. I’ll be here every day. It’s nice to see how God works and his blessings every day,” he said.
Following the remarks, Heath, Luke and Wade Christian were joined by Jones County Commissioners John Wood and Sam Kitchens, and business and community leaders in turning the shovels.
The Surcheros website states the restaurant began serving freshly prepared Tex-Mex favorites in 2007 in Douglas and quickly became a community favorite. It became a franchise in 2017 across South Georgia and Florida.
Surcheros moved its corporate headquarters to Alpharetta in 2022, and the franchise is currently located in communities in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.
