A Deeper Dive

What is the future of restaurant automation? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Matt Newberg, the founder of the media platform Hngry. Hngry is a subscription media platform that examines how technology is reshaping our food system through trends like ghost kitchens, microfulfillment, fungi-based proteins, personalized nutrition and other things. We talk...

Why are chocolate milkshakes so important to Cameron Mitchell? This week's episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Mitchell, founder of Cameron Mitchell Restaurants and one of the country's most successful restaurant creators. Mitchell's company operates 64 restaurants in 20 brands, including the fine dining brand Ocean Prime. He talks about his reasons for starting a res...

The plant-based meat trend is dead. Or maybe it isn’t. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast “A Deeper Dive” is about plant-based meat, and specifically, why fake meat hasn’t quite taken off at fast-food restaurants the way many predicted three years ago. Nancy Kruse, RB’s menu trends columnist, joins me on the podcast to discuss the topic. While products like Impossible Foods and...

What happens when you combine chicken wings and sandwiches? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features David Bloom, chief operating and development officer for Capriotti’s, a Las Vegas chain of sandwich shops. Capriotti’s acquired Wing Zone in 2021. Capriotti’s operates 175 locations. Wing Zone now operates 61. Bloom talks about that combination and what the comp...

How are younger consumers reacting to inflation? This week’s episode of A Deeper Dive features Lori Rakoczy, associate principal with Restaurant Business sister company Technomic and one of the co-authors of the blog Technomic’s Take. And we’re talking about inflation. Specifically, we’re talking about how younger consumers are dealing with high prices. Menu prices have taken off over the past yea...

What is Killer Burger and where is it going? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features John Dikos, CEO of the 20-unit Killer Burger, along with VP of Financial Planning Adam Sanders. The episode was recorded at the ICR Conference, where we spoke with the two about the burger chain and its overall growth strategy. Killer Burger operates 20 company and franchised...

How is Cava Group’s integration of Zoe’s Kitchen restaurants going? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Brett Schulman, the CEO of Cava Group, who talks about a wide variety of topics, but particularly his company's integration of Zoe’s Kitchen. Cava acquired Zoe’s in 2018 in one of the more interesting deals of recent vintage. Both were fast-casual Medite...

What is the story behind Dave’s Hot Chicken? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features two people behind one of the hottest chains in the country: Bill Phelps, Dave’s CEO, and Arman Oganesyan, one of the company’s cofounders. Dave’s is the fastest-growing restaurant chain in the U.S. right now. The chain, which sells a menu of spicy chicken tenders or sandwiches...

Restaurants are in a stronger financial position now than they were before the pandemic. This week’s episode of A Deeper Dive features Michael Swanson, an agricultural economist and consultant for Wells Fargo. Swanson has been on the podcast before and talks about the current and future state of food costs. Commodity price inflation hammered the industry last year. Those costs have started to ease...

Is tipping out of hand at fast-food restaurants? This week’s episode of A Deeper Dive I speak features Robert Byrne, director of consumer and industry insights with our sister company Technomic, who talks about convenience, value and tipping. Byrne oversees consumer surveys with Technomic talks extensively about consumers’ views on a host of issues related to restaurants. He discusses why consumer...

Why do companies franchise their business? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Gary Occhiogrosso the founder of Franchise Growth Solutions, who talks about the opportunities and challenges involved in franchising. Occhiogrosso has been involved in the business for a long time and we talk about his history, first as a franchisee and later as the founder of...

Did Starbucks win its labor battle? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features a debate between myself and Peter Romeo, the editor at large of RB, on the success of Starbucks’ pushback against unions. For some time, it seemed that another Starbucks store formed a union every few hours. The push, the most successful effort to unionize a restaurant chain, contribut...

Restaurant automation is coming rapidly. But how much of an impact will it have? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Juan Martinez, principal with the consulting firm Profitality, who talks about the growing use of automation. Martinez is a periodic guest on the podcast and he works with restaurants to improve their overall profitability. Automation has be...

Can dine-in pizza still work? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features a trio of executives from Mountain Mike’s Pizza: co-CEO and brand owners Chris Britt and Ed St. Geme and COO Jim Metevier. Mountain Mike’s is a California-based chain that operates about 270 locations. Britt and St. Geme bought the chain about six years ago. The trio talk about the history o...

What is the future of casual dining? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features John Cywinski, the president of the casual-dining brand Applebee’s, to discuss that very topic. Bar and grill chains like Applebee’s had generally struggled since the Great Recession. And then the pandemic forced them to figure out takeout and delivery, and many of them did. But the p...

Does the fast-casual sector exist? In this week’s episode of a Deeper Dive I’m joined by my colleague Lisa Jennings to talk about the blurring of the lines in the restaurant industry—particularly between fast-casual and quick-service restaurants. The fast-casual sector represented a group of higher-end limited-service concepts and until the pandemic largely dominated industry growth over the past...

Amusements have been, quite literally, a game-changer for Cicis. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Jeff Hetsel, the president of the 300-unit pizza buffet chain. Cicis has had a strong performance coming out of the pandemic, with sales up 14.5% last year, according to Technomic. One of the big reasons is video games. The company has been convincing opera...

How can restaurants avoid becoming a political football? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Joe Kefauver, the managing partner with public affairs firm Align Public Strategies and cohost of the RB-hosted Working Lunch podcast. Kefauver discusses a variety of topics, including a backlash against corporate ESG strategies. ESG stands for environmental, socia...

How can operators avoid price increases as their own costs increase? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Rich Shank, senior principal with RB sister company Technomic. He discusses the challenging operating environment when it comes to menu pricing. Restaurants have been raising prices aggressively this year as higher prices for food and labor eat into mar...

The beverage business is rapidly changing and drive-thru coffee concepts like Scooters Coffee are right in the middle of it. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Joe Thornton, the president of Scooter’s. Scooter’s has quietly been one of the fastest growing restaurant chains in the U.S. System sales and unit count have nearly tripled over the past five year...

If you haven’t come across a bubble tea concept yet, you will quite soon. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Paul Reynish, who was named global CEO of the bubble tea concept Gong Cha earlier this year. Gong Cha was founded in Taiwan in 1996 and is now based in London. It has quietly been one of the fastest-growing chains in the country. It operates more t...

How big of a deal is the unionization effort at Starbucks? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features my colleague Peter Romeo, who talks about the ongoing unionization campaign at the coffee giant. More than 200 Starbucks locations have voted to form a union. The company has undertaken a massive effort to stop it. Peter and I discuss that unionization campaign,...

The nation’s opioid crisis grew much worse during the pandemic. And it has hit restaurants particularly hard. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Rick Van Warner, a former longtime industry executive and ex-CEO of the Tex-Mex chain Tijuana Flats. He is also on the board at Project Opioid, a Florida-based agency that works with employers on the opioid crisi...

Can fries fix Quiznos? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Mark Lohmann, the president of Rego Restaurant Group, which owns Quiznos as well as its sister chain Taco Del Mar. Quiznos has gone from nearly 4,700 U.S. restaurants in 2006 to just 200 now, plus fewer than 300 internationally, a 90% reduction in total unit count that is unprecedented in restauran...

How did Smoothie King convince franchisees to go along with a complete menu overhaul? And how did customers react? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Wan Kim, the CEO and owner of the Texas-based Smoothie King brand. Kim was a franchisee of the brand in South Korea before he bought the company and moved to the U.S. Smoothie King has been one of the countr...