Restaurant industry veteran Marc Buehler has been named concept president for O'Charley's, giving company President and CEO David Head a lieutenant he worked closely with until about five years ago.

Buehler will start at his new job on Friday and is taking over from Wilson Craft, who resigned three weeks ago. In June of this year, he stepped down as president and CEO of Kona Grill after about 20 at-times tumultuous months on the job. Before that, he was CEO of LS Management, the operator of nearly 200 Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon and Texas Land & Cattle Steak House locations.

It was in the job before that that Buehler (pictured here in a photo from Strength.org) worked for Head as vice president of marketing at Romacorp, which oversees 200 Tony Roma’s restaurants. After Head stepped down in 2006 as Romacorp's boss — the company was then reorganizing under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection — the chain's board tapped Buehler to take over.

“Marc Buehler has an outstanding reputation as a result of his demonstrated capabilities in all aspects of leading a restaurant concept, as well as a strong commitment to deliver memorable dining experiences,” Head said in a statement. “We are confident of Marc’s ability to contribute significantly to our ongoing work of returning the O’Charley’s concept to a path of long-term profitable growth and development.”

The full details of Buehler's compensation package have not been made public yet — Craft took home $537,000 in 2010 — but O'Charley's did say it has awarded him stock options to buy 100,000 shares. The options will all vest three years from now.