Restaurateurs outside Las Vegas are likely to react with amazement, envy and perhaps disbelief on first glance at this year’s ranking of the Top 100 Independent Restaurants. But no, it’s not a misprint: Tao Las Vegas Restaurant & Nightclub had food-and-beverage sales of $66.6 million last year.

Those are the revenues of a single operation, albeit one covering 62,000 square feet. By itself, Tao Las Vegas amassed sales that would have placed it as No. 309 in last year’s ranking of the Top 400 Chains, just behind the combined $67 million in sales for Cousins Subs’ 156 restaurants.

Tao Las Vegas’ record-breaking, eye-popping performance will capture a lot of attention within and outside of the foodservice industry, and rightly so. But if the conclusion drawn is that the restaurant business has fundamentally changed and that an experience that Tao Las Vegas calls “vibe dining” is what is needed to draw consumers, that will be unfortunate.

The Las Vegas dining scene is unlike any other. The city’s meteoric rise as a culinary destination brought with it intense competition for customers looking to be wowed as well as fed. Marc Packer and Richard Wolf, who own the Tao locations in Las Vegas and New York City, have proved themselves to be among the industry’s best at understanding that many guests seek a bit of theater and an extraordinary experience in addition to a dazzling meal.

But there are 100 restaurants on the list, and considered as a whole, as they should be, they are an affirmation that the fundamentals of hospitality are healthy and unchanged, not a signal that every restaurant needs a touch of Cirque du Soleil to succeed. To be sure, there are many operations with stunning designs and décors throughout the Top 100; atmosphere was important long before the first celebrity-chef restaurant arrived in Las Vegas. But the most imaginative interior or the most breathtaking view never has been enough if food and service quality falter.

There are no 20-foot-tall Buddha statues or light shows in Chicago’s Gibsons Bar Steakhouse, but the steaks are thick, prime and perfectly grilled. The dining room seats only 170, with room for 60 at the always- crowded bar, yet the restaurant logged sales of $20.8 million. The Angus Barn in Raleigh, N.C., hasn’t a bit of neon glitz, but it served more than 230,000 guests last year. The two Montgomery Inn locations in Cincinnati each welcomed 500,000 customers hungry for the restaurants’ signature barbecued ribs.

There is no single model for success in the restaurant business, which is part of its glory. But all of the operations on this year’s Top 100 Independent Restaurants list know that whatever its outward guises, success rests on a foundation of unflinching quality, honest value and attentive service. Waterfalls are optional.