Is Scaling a Wise Investment?

And we likewise have Clinton Anderson, the CEO of Fourth, who will be moderating the conversation with Jason. Jason, how about I let you offer the audience some details about your background and you can likewise tell them a little bit about Chop Shop.

My name is Jason Morgan, CEO of Original Chop Shop. We purchased the brand name in 2016three unitsand I have actually grown it to 26. After a short stint of attempting to be an accounting professional for about a year and a half, I transitioned into gambling establishment residential or commercial property and worked in corporate financing.

I was the very first staff member there after private equity bought the company. Assisted grow that from 20 to 150 places, took it public in 2014, and after that left about a year and a half after going public to do this at Chop Shop. My hope is that we can replicate the success we had at Zos, and we're off to a really excellent start.

We're at the counter, we bring the food to the table. It is mainly protein bowlsabout 40 percent of the mix. We also do salads, sandwiches. The secret to the program is we have a drink component also with fresh-squeezed juices and protein shakes. We do all stables, we do breakfast throughout the day.

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A little more complex than some of the walk-the-line ideas that are out there, but we think we have actually got something quite special. We're going to include another store this year and a minimum of 4 shops next year. We will be 31 or so stores by the end of next year.

Profitable Hospitality Ventures Arising in 2026

I've been in this function for about six years. 4th, as many of you know, is a leading company of software application options to the dining establishment and hospitality industry. Our goal is to help our customers be effective in driving success and being efficientmanaging labor, handling inventory, and generally providing them with tools they require to deliver their vision.

It's unusual to have companies that are beloved and growing rapidly, that can repeat that success every year. Jason, one of the reasons I was so thrilled to have you join our session is the success at Zos was fantastic. I've only met a handful of brands where there was such a strong customer affinity for the brand name.

When you talk to consumers about Chop Shop, they like the place. And to be able to take what is a fairly complex concept in terms of delivering a fantastic experience for the client, and be able to grow that from a couple of shops to now north of 30 stores next yearit's remarkable.

We're going to discuss how to scale a restaurant company. Every restaurateur I ever talk with has dreams of taking one shop, two shops, five stores, and turning it into something much biggerexpanding across the city, throughout the state, into multiple states, and ultimately nationwide, even global reach. It's not easy, particularly in today's environment.

Labor is difficult. Inventory expenses remain high. It's not a simple time to drive profitability and development at the very same time. However we're happy to have you here today, Jason, due to the fact that we're going to go into that topic. The questions are going to be actually around: how do you grow an organization? How do you scale it and make it effective? How do you duplicate early success? And from there, after we speak about your experience and the lessons you've learned, we 'd like to then say: well, look, how could technology assist? How can you utilize innovation as a multiplier to reproduce early success to significant success? Second, beyond innovation, how do you scale excellent teams? And lastly, AI.

Is Scaling the Best Investment?

The first concern I have for you, Jasonlook, you've done this two times now in the dining establishment market. What has your experience been in terms of what it takes to really drive success in expanding dining establishments?

We talked a little bit before we began about LinkedIn, and I've got a post teed up to follow this next week about what the playbook is likepoint by pointfor growing a company. To me, one of the key things, and I feel very lucky, is that both brands I've been included with are unique.

And there's absolutely nothing exactly like Chop Shop in terms of what we're finishing with a large, varied menu. The majority of brands today are very singularly focused in regards to what they're using from a foodstuff. I seem like we started at a benefit with both brands by having something unique that filled a niche no one else was doing.

A lot of it starts with the brand. Does your brand have something unique that no one else is doing?

Regional Success in Brand Scaling

The second thingI came from a financing background, so a lot of my knowings are more financing and data-driven versus a great deal of early start-up restaurateurs who are creative types. They enjoy the food, they developed the menu, they constructed the brand. I probably couldn't do that from scratch. If you offered me something that has all those components in location, I can take it from there and put the playbook in location.

They don't know their breakeven sales. They do not understand how margin enhances as sales increase. I have actually seen so lots of business where the numbers simply do not work.

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If you don't have those two things, you should not be building shops. Because as I hear your description, you have actually highlighted 3 things: execution, brand differentiation, and financial viability.

Key Strategies for Expanding Hospitality Brands

Second, you need a compelling brand name or special idea that resonates with clients. And 3rd, the mathematics needs to work. If you don't comprehend your system economics, your fixed and variable expenses, you might be expanding blind and losing money. Exactly. And another key lesson has to do with going into new markets.

When we expanded to Dallas, I expected brand-new stores to do 5070% of Phoenix sales in the very first year. Too numerous operators presume brand-new markets will open at full volume day one.