Nothing serves up a great time like a good workout and a drink with friends. Just ask Chris Shaheen, the founder and managing partner of The Oasis, a sand volleyball facility and Baton Rouge’s newest entertainment destination.
From managing a health club with a sports bar attached to it in Las Vegas, to working as a real estate broker and developer in Baton Rouge, this Lake Charles native sees The Oasis as an intersection of two passions—and south Baton Rouge’s next big thing, as Business Report details in its latest entrepreneur feature.
“I was driven by the belief that something like this on the other side of town would be very successful,” Shaheen says, referring to the Mango’s facility on Sherwood Forest Boulevard.
Shaheen first got the idea for a sports entertainment development on a trip with friends to Gulf Shores for a volleyball tournament. Years later, in 2012, he and two partners made a strategic buy of property on Burbank Drive, near where the city-parish plans to eventually connect the two major traffic arteries with the Kenilworth extension.
A core feature of Shaheen’s concept included establishing a high-quality restaurant on site. Sammy Nagem of Sammy’s Grill had been looking to launch a second concept and decided to open and operate Sammy’s Creole Cabana at The Oasis.
“There is a reason to go just for the food,” Shaheen says of the new restaurant, which operates independently from his business.
The Oasis opened this summer with a bar and patio large enough to accommodate nearly 700 people, the Creole Cabana restaurant, a pro shop, Baton Rouge’s largest outdoor screen and seven volleyball courts that can handle a 250 team tournament.
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