Al Copeland liked his restaurants 'cold, dark and loud.' The next generation brings new ideas.

The fried chicken with biscuits and red beans at Copeland’s of New Orleans are each a bit different from Popeyes, but their recipes were set by the same hand and they aren’t changing anytime soon. The artichoke and spinach dip with fried bow tie pasta screams throwback dish but remains a top seller and isn’t going anywhere either.

But beyond the menu, much is about to change for all Copeland’s restaurants. A restaurant name that this year turns 40 is now trying to reintroduce itself in a changing restaurant market, and a new design and branding overhaul is part of that pitch.

To see what’s to come for the 16 locations now located around the region, check out the Copeland’s in Covington.

A nearly $1.4 million project has transformed the look and feel of the large restaurant, and those changes will be repeated at all other locations beginning in the months ahead.

“To remain relevant after 40 years is a huge deal to me,” said Al Copeland Jr., president and CEO of parent company Al Copeland Concepts. “How do you take an institutional brand and keep it relevant as times change? We’re trying to modernize a piece of classic New Orleans.”

New philosophy

His father the late Al Copeland Sr. was already famous as the founder of Popeyes when he opened the first Copeland’s of New Orleans in 1983. The idea, his son remembers today, was “to get fine dining food into a casual setting.”

“When he created it, he wanted it to be cold, dark and loud,” Copeland said. “That was his restaurant philosophy. But now we've gone light, bright, modern and fun. What was vibrant then is different from now.”

The restaurant looks different from the street, starting with the script of its name, a new design updating the flowing letters of the past.

An expanded patio adds more outdoor dining. Inside, a bakery area has been moved to the kitchen, opening up the entrance. There’s brighter colors, more natural light coming in and different dining areas around the large space, from bar to banquettes.

While the menu includes some dishes that have been in rotation since 1983, lighter additions have turned up, like the “garden chicken” (grilled and served with squash noodles and lemon butter). More lighter dishes along these lines will join the menu eventually.

There were once 40 Copeland’s restaurants in the 1980s. Now the brand has 16 locations, a mix of franchises and restaurants run by Copeland’s company. That company remains a family affair. Copeland’s daughter Allison Donnelly now runs the restaurant division.

She said the new design and branding were guided in part by the restaurants’ experience in the pandemic. Copeland’s started a curbside option for takeout orders years earlier, and it greatly expanded in the early phases of the crisis. Now takeout accounts for 30% of sales.

Donnelly said much of that growth comes from younger customers. Part of the redesign goal was to make dining in the restaurant more attractive to them too.

“These are people who remember Copeland’s from coming with their families or coming for prom dinners,” she said. “We want them to bring their families the way their families brought them.”

Though Al Copeland Sr. founded Popeyes, he lost his creation in the 1990s to creditors. It’s now a Florida-based company that has expanded globally.

However, Al Copeland Jr. and his family still run the Madisonville-based food company Diversified Foods and Seasonings, which supplies Popeyes with the spice blend for its fried chicken, with its red beans and Cajun rice, with its biscuit mix and with other cornerstone flavors.

Diversified also supplies Copeland’s restaurants. The fried chicken spice blend is different from Popeyes (and similarly, it is secret, Copeland affirmed) but paired with smoky-flavor red beans and a biscuit it hits notes as familiar as the Copeland restaurant name itself.

Copeland’s of New Orleans

660 Hwy. 190, Covington, (985) 809-9659

For other locations, see copelandsofneworleans.com