(keep reading to learn what happened)
Season: 6 | View All Season 6 Episodes
Original Episode Air Date: May 6, 2018
The Bar's Original Name Was: Copper Rocket Pub
Copper Rocket Pub Address: 106 Lake Ave Maitland, FL 32751
Episode Recap
The Copper Rocket Pub was a Maitland, Florida bar that was featured on Season 6 of Bar Rescue.
Though the Copper Rocket Bar Rescue episode aired in May 2018, the actual filming and visit from Jon Taffer took place before that.
It was Season 6 Episode 9 and the episode name was “Crazy Little Thing Called Selman”.
Copper Rocket Pub is in Maitland, FL.
Maitland is a small city that’s in the suburbs of Orlando, one of the largest metropolitan areas in Florida.
Selman Markovic bought the bar on a whim in 2015.
That means he’s been running it for about three years at the time of the Copper Rocket Bar Rescue episode.
Unfortunately, he has no experience in the hospitality industry.
The bar has been open for over twenty years and has a large customer base, which gave it a strong foundation to start.
Selman wanted to improve an already successful pub, so he brought in local art performers.
Instead of gaining customers, he drove away from his loyal ones. Oopsie!
Selman cannot lead the bar.
The bar is falling apart and in debt.
Expert mixologist Lisamarie Joyce and Chef Vic Vega join Jon Taffer to help rescue the Copper Rocket Pub.
They all agree they like the bar’s exterior but hate the interior.
Jon points out Norman, the manager, the bartenders, Rachel and Jacob, and Dowell, the cook.
A local DJ, Johnny Magic, spies on the bar for Jon.
He orders a light beer but is given a warm and sour one.
Rachel ignores him at the bar.
Finally, he orders a Philly cheesesteak and pretzels.
The food is no longer on the menu, and Johnny changes his order to onion rings and chicken tenders.
It is terrible, which is about what you’d expect from a bar that’s making an appearance on Bar Rescue.
The bar also has other entertainment going on.
They have a fire-breather in the parking lot and a contortionist performing in the bar.
One customer is getting painted.
Jon Taffer goes in to confront Selman after seeing him be rude to customers.
He will not take accountability, and Jon says he has to.
Norman says that the staff does not come to work because they avoid Selman.
The next day at the staff meeting, the staff tell Jon that Selman’s negative attitude brings down the bar.
Selman tries to explain his ideas, but he doesn’t see they are not working.
The experts are brought in to try to turn things around.
Chef Vic Vega shows the staff how to make a burger in under a minute.
Lisamarie tells the team the bar must be cleaned, but Selman has more excuses.
She then shows them cocktails with a beer and wine menu.
Customers come in for the stress test.
The drinks being served are easy to make with just two ingredients, which should set the Copper Rocket Pub up for success in the stress test.
Even so, the bartenders are too slow.
As a result of the slow service, customers are left waiting.
Food is being served cold, and one side of the bar is ignored.
Selman is overwhelmed and says he can’t be everywhere at once.
Lisamarie warns Norman to get Selman in line.
Selman makes excuses for why the stress test failed.
Jon Taffer and Lisamarie get into a verbal argument with Selman.
The next day training continues.
The bar learns how to make a sake cocktail, and the kitchen is trained on a turkey sandwich.
After talking with Jon, Selman decides to change his ways.
While the experts are training the staff, Jon Taffer and his crew get to work on renovations for the Copper Rocket Pub.
Unlike a lot of other bars that appear on the show, Jon Taffer decided not to change the name or the exterior.
The bar has only been changed on the inside.
The bar now has one central theme with rocket-shaped tables and decor.
The bar was also gifted two new POS systems and a new draft beer system.
The bar and kitchen staff keep up during the relaunch.
The customers are happy with the atmosphere, food, and drinks.
So was the Bar Rescue Copper Rocket Pub visit a success? Keep reading the update to learn what happened next and if it’s still open in 2024 and beyond.
Copper Rocket Pub Update - What Happened Next?
Now that we’ve recapped the Copper Rocket Bar Rescue visit, let’s talk about what happened to the bar after Jon Taffer and his crew left Maitland, FL.
At the standard six-week check-in, we learn that sales at the bar have increased, but only by a modest ~5% or so.
Norman is now in charge of the day-to-day operations instead of Selman.
Overall, things seem to be going very well for the Copper Rock in Maitland, with little signs of that slowing down.
Is Copper Rocket Pub from Bar Rescue still open?
As of 2023, The Copper Rocket is still open and serving customers in Maitland, FL.
However, it’s doing so under new ownership, as Selman sold the bar shortly after the visit from Jon Taffer and the Bar Rescue crew.
It seems like the new owners also did some of their own renovations, so it might not be exactly like Jon Taffer left it.
The Copper Rocket regularly posts on Facebook and seems to have tons of different events, such as dueling pianos, karaoke, trivia, and more.
Here’s an example:
Reviews for the bar are generally quite good under the current ownership, as it has a 4 star rating on Yelp and a 4.3 star rating on Google Reviews.
Here’s a small sampling of reviews that were written after Jon Taffer visited Copper Rocket.
4 star review from September 2022:
The Copper Rocket is great, especially with all their improvements over the last few years.
The food was tasty (wish I took a picture of their giant pretzel to share here but my friend and I plunged into it too quickly!) and the waiter we had was friendly and great.
I’ve also done trivia and karaoke here in the past and that was also really fun and well done!
5 star review from November 2022:
The Copper Rocket has been around for a while, but was completely renovated in 2018 by Bar Rescue.
They now have a full liquor bar.
Aesthetically, the bar is beautiful compared to what it used to be.
The food is also very good.
The chicken tenders are huge and so are the salads.
They have some great entertainment as well.
Trivia, dueling pianos, karaoke, comedy shows–just check their calendar on their website!
5 star review from March 2018:
I stopped in because it was featured on Bar Rescue but found it has new owners since than.
They also remodeled it again I would have to say it’s one of the nicer bars I’ve seen.
I met the owner and he was really nice and they have a open mike night.
Had a nice stage and lots of TVs a great looking bar top plus lots of selections.
It’s worth stopping if your in Maitland.
However, it’s not all positive. For example, consider this 2-star review from August 2022:
The food has gone downhill fast.
What used to be reliable and consistent has been totally unpredictable the last few times.
The fish and chips we most recently ordered had a huge amount of salt in the batter or something, we couldn’t even eat it.
I normally love salty food – this was just gross!
There were other really weird problems like what I believe were super old bits of dough that got baked into my pizza and became hard as bone.
Thought I was going to crack a tooth.
Very unfortunate that what used to be a pretty awesome choice for food has gone so far south…
Why is Copper Rocket doing so well?
Personally, I don’t find it surprising that the Copper Rocket is still doing well because they seem to have a strong marketing presence.
For example, the Copper Rocket website is actually optimized for search engines, which is something that’s pretty rare to see in a Bar Rescue bar (in fact, a lot of bars don’t even have websites, which is crazy to me).
If you’re in the Maitland, FL area and you’d like to check out the bar, you can learn more and see the full menu at the official Copper Rocket website.
To sum up:
Copper Rocket is still open, which makes it kind of a Bar Rescue success story. However, the ownership is different from what you saw on the show.
If you want to see some other nearby Florida Bar Rescue episodes, you can check out my updates for Murphy’s Arcade in Sanford, Lake House in Mount Dora, and Rockin’ Rhonda’s in Sanford.
Thanks for reading!
More Information
https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-copper-rocket-maitlandhttps://www.facebook.com/thecopperrocket/
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Last updated: 2023-02-27 07:06
What happened to Norman? He is a solid dude.
This is just a guess, but since they were really close, possibly best friends, I’d say he’s still there working his magic.
He’s great at his job, the bar is still open so idk why he would leave, especially when business is continuing to do well.
How did they screw up stress test with 2 drinks with 2 ingredients??
Something didn’t seem right about that.
Then during the update sales are up 5%? They were going behind before you can’t tell me 5% uptick in sales brought them out of the hole. Seems to be a staged bar rescue
Yet another knucklehead owner who pretends he loves his bar only to sell it once the door hits Taffer’s ass on the way out.
Selman seems like a nice guy, but I think he needs a handler.
I sincerely hope his staff is doing well wherever they landed.
Selman, another lobotomy victim?
This dork had no idea how to treat customers or employees.
I’m glad the bar not only has new owners but is also doing well. Selman was an arrogant,entitled jerk. His head was not programmed to be a boss never mind a bar
I read that there is a new speakeasy style tiki bar hidden inside the Copper Rocket. Looks awesome based on posted pics. The new owners seem to have the right touch. I’d be willing to check it out for sure.
Interesting! I will try to do some digging when I have some free time. Thanks for letting me know.