SEMSOM RESTAURANT TOPS THE ARABIA 500 FROM LEBANON

Ranked #1 for Lebanon on the Arabia 500, Christine Sfeir is a dynamic food entrepreneur and her restaurant chain Semsom is expanding just as quickly as she envisioned.  With three locations in Lebanon, Semsom now has franchises in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and plans to soon be in Iraq and Qatar. 

Sfeir began her restaurant career at the tender age of 22 when she opened the first Dunkin Donuts store in Beirut.  What she did not know at the time is that she would become a pioneer in food services and emergency management.   Operating in the fiercely competitive Lebanese food market, she created a trendy Dunkin’ Donuts store design with bright colors and stylish furniture, and introduced food and coffee products that were adopted by Dunkin’ Donuts in other countries.  When the 2006 war hit Lebanon, several of her then 30 stores were in dangerous locations.  As a cash business she only had two options at the time - either shut down and let her employees go or immediately relocate.  Sfeir and her team developed expertise in rapid store set up. They were able to be up and running in a new location in days, with supply systems uninterrupted, and using the stores in the new safe locations as dormitories.

One  year later, in May 2007, Sfeir was in Washington D.C. for a conference when an encounter with a Lebanese taxi driver complaining about the lack of good Lebanese food led to the creation of Semsom. The restaurant chain was designed to highlight the culinary culture of Lebanon that Sfeir  loves.  In May 2008, she opened the first Semsom restaurant, featuring a blend of traditional Lebanese recipes with a modern twist.  Her restaurants are often packed, with customers lingering for hours. Sfeir’s long term goal is to go global with franchises, and one day she hopes to open Semsom in Washington D.C. and invite all the taxi drivers. 

Sfeir knows a thing or two about global franchises.  As the owner of 30 Dunkin Donuts stores, she knows what it takes to build scalable systems and to create engaged teams and managers.  She is also married to Carlos Sfeir, who occupies the #4 spot for Lebanon on the Arabia 500 with his successful industrial kitchen company.  They are the only husband and wife team who have made the Arabia 500, each with their own company.

She has his full support..  “He is the one I go to with my ideas.  He is a visionary who expanded his family’s business to Africa and to other parts of the Middle East, and he helps me push my ideas forward,” says Sfeir.  She chuckles, adding that she also gets good deals from him on the industrial kitchen equipment for the Semsom restaurants.

Not content with her past and current achievements, Sfeir has just opened an Italian restaurant Basilio, and hopes to launch many more ideas leveraging Lebanon’s strength as a food hub.