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And we likewise have Clinton Anderson, the CEO of 4th, who will be moderating the discussion with Jason. Jason, how about I let you provide the audience some info about your background and you can also inform them a little bit about Chop Store.

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

I was the first employee there after personal equity bought the service. Helped grow that from 20 to 150 locations, took it public in 2014, and then left about a year and a half after going public to do this at Chop Shop. My hope is that we can duplicate the success we had at Zos, and we're off to a really good start.

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

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A little more complicated than a few of the walk-the-line concepts that are out there, but we think we've got something quite special. We're going to add another shop this year and a minimum of four stores next year. So we will be 31 approximately stores by the end of next year.

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Hey, everyone. It's terrific to be with you again. My name is Clinton Anderson. I'm the CEO here at Fourth. I've been in this role for about six years. 4th, as much of you know, is a leading provider of software application services to the dining establishment and hospitality industry. Our goal is to assist our clients be successful in driving profitability and being efficientmanaging labor, handling stock, and basically providing them with tools they need to deliver their vision.

It's uncommon to have companies that are beloved and growing quickly, that can duplicate that success year after year. Jason, one of the factors I was so excited to have you join our session is the success at Zos was incredible. I have actually only met a handful of brands where there was such a strong consumer affinity for the brand.

When you talk to clients about Chop Shop, they enjoy the location. And to be able to take what is a fairly complicated concept in terms of delivering a terrific experience for the customer, and be able to grow that from a couple of stores to now north of 30 stores next yearit's incredible.

We're going to talk about how to scale a restaurant company. Every restaurateur I ever talk with has imagine taking one shop, two shops, five shops, and turning it into something much biggerexpanding across the city, throughout the state, into multiple states, and ultimately nationwide, even international reach. However it's challenging, specifically in today's environment.

Labor is difficult. Inventory costs remain high. It's not a simple time to drive profitability and development at the exact same time. But we're thankful to have you here today, Jason, due to the fact that we're going to dig into that subject. 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 reproduce early success? And from there, after we discuss your experience and the lessons you've discovered, we 'd love to then state: well, appearance, how could innovation help? How can you use innovation as a multiplier to duplicate early success to far-reaching success? Second, beyond technology, how do you scale terrific groups? And last but not least, AI.

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The very first question I have for you, Jasonlook, you've done this twice now in the restaurant market. What has your experience been in terms of what it takes to truly drive success in expanding dining establishments?

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

And there's absolutely nothing exactly like Chop Shop in regards to what we're doing with a big, varied menu. The majority of brand names today are really singularly focused in terms of what they're providing from a food. I seem like we started at a benefit with both brands by having something unique that filled a niche nobody else was doing.

A lot of it begins with the brand. Does your brand name have something special that no one else is doing?

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The 2nd thingI originated from a financing background, so a lot of my knowings are more finance and data-driven versus a lot of early startup restaurateurs who are innovative types. They enjoy the food, they developed the menu, they constructed the brand name. I most likely could not do that from scratch. However if you provided me something that has all those components in place, I can take it from there and put the playbook in location.

They don't know their breakeven sales. They don't understand how margin enhances as sales boost. They don't comprehend cash-on-cash returns. I've seen numerous business where the numbers simply don't work. And yet individuals say: let's open 10 more. And I'll say: why? It does not make money. Stop. You require to discover a concept that is special.

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If you do not have those two things, you should not be building shops. Yeah, perhaps both? Due to the fact that as I hear your description, you have actually highlighted three things: execution, brand distinction, and financial viability. You have actually got to start with execution. If you don't have an operating model that works, broadening it simply multiplies problems.

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Second, you need an engaging brand or unique concept that resonates with clients. And 3rd, the math needs to work. If you don't comprehend your system economics, your repaired and variable costs, you might be expanding blind and losing money. Precisely. And another key lesson has to do with entering new markets.

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