Owners and Co-founders Bill and Lovett Bayne opened Fish City Grill with the hopes of bringing people in for the food but getting them to come back because of the environment and community that is built in each store, the couple said.

The background

Bill Bayne often visited the “warm, green, balmy coastal Texas” where he often ate seafood with his family.

“Seafood became synonymous with vacation, family, [and] friends,” Bill Bayne said. “It’s just a unique, fun [and] warm experience.”

After Bill and Lovett Bayne met, they started a 12 table restaurant in Dallas. Now Fish City Grill has expanded to 17 restaurants across Texas and one in Arkansas, Florida and Oklahoma.


On the menu

The seafood restaurant in Prosper serves a variety of seafood dishes including shrimp and chicken penne alfredo, blackened rainbow trout and fresh oysters with a specialty dish of oyster nachos. Other fan favorites include the fish and chips and fish tacos.

“Serving and selling great seafood is not easy so we're proud we are able to do that,” Bill Bayne said.

Chalkboard specials are created every day by the executive chef or the general manager of each store. The specials are seasonal and include five specials a day.


“I'll bring in fish that is unique to the area based on talking to the customers and seeing what they would like here,” said Chris Martinez, general manager of Fish City Grill Prosper. “It's just our own creativity that we get to put into each of the dishes.”

Giving back

In 2001, the Bayne’s saw the impact of 9/11 and decided to give back to local charities. That’s when they started the First Tuesday Benefit. On the first Tuesday of each month, every store takes 15% of the sales made that day and donates it to a local charity of their choosing.

Since they have started this fund, a total of $2 million has been donated to local charities, Bill Bayne said.


What’s special about it?

Fish City Grill prides themselves in creating a fun environment where team members can be themselves, Martinez said.

“We have a group of individual people that are all unique in their own way that bring some value to this restaurant,” Martinez said.

Fish City Grill’s “no schmucks” policy ensures they choose staff members that value their work and have strong morals and ethics.


“There’s such a strong connection between customers and staff,” Lovett Bayne said. “It really is a community within our four walls.”