A Deeper Dive

How are restaurant companies finding and keeping workers right now? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast “A Deeper Dive” features Editor-at-Large Peter Romeo, who joins Editor-in-Chief Jonathan Maze to discuss the labor shortage and how restaurants are combating the problem. Restaurants of all kinds have reported difficulties hiring employees, to the point that many locations are closing early or for entire days because of worker shortages. Entire locations have been slow to reopen after the pandemic in part because of labor. It’s not just inside the restaurants. The labor shortage is making it difficult for restaurants to get supplies because of a lack of drivers and there are some concerns that it’s causing issues throughout the supply chain.

The three biggest franchise brands in the world are all embroiled in disputes with their U.S. franchisees. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast “A Deeper Dive” features John Gordon, a restaurant consultant out of San Diego, who talks about these disputes and why they’re happening. The three brands are McDonald’s, Subway and 7-Eleven. At McDonald’s, franchisees have been pushing back against a $70 million technology fee and could take legal action to stop it.

Virtual brands are all the rage right now. But how do they work? And how can they succeed with so many of them out there? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast “A Deeper Dive” focuses on this topic and features Alex Canter, the founder of Ordermark, who provides advice and insight into the creation of these concepts. Canter’s company includes Nextbite, a creator and operator of virtual concepts—which operate for a primarily delivery customer out of leased kitchens at places like restaurants or hotels or ghost kitchens. Nextbite’s brands include Grilled Cheese Society and Hotbox by Wiz Khalifa. Canter talks about what differentiates successful virtual brands and how to best succeed at creating them. He also talks about his own history in the restaurant business.

How did Domino’s become a tech company? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast “A Deeper Dive” features Dennis Maloney, the Ann Arbor, Mich.-based pizza chain’s chief innovation officer who discusses the company’s effective use of technology. Maloney talks about what it takes for a pizza chain to become a tech company. He also talks about robots, including Domino’s partnership with Nuro to use its robot to deliver pizzas in Houston. He also talks about what it will take for that robot to go into more widespread use.

The restaurant industry has enjoyed some remarkably strong sales so far this year. The Restaurant Business team of editors want to know how long this will last. Senior Editor Heather Lalley, along with Editor-at-Large Peter Romeo, discuss the recent spate of strong sales numbers.

How was Jersey Mike’s able to outperform all of its competitors, and most of the restaurant industry, in 2020? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast “A Deeper Dive” features Peter Cancro, owner and CEO of the sandwich chain, to talk about the company’s performance. Jersey Mike’s last year was the 10th fastest growing chain among the Technomic top 500 even as most of its competitors struggled, notably the giant Subway.

Consumers are changing again coming out of the pandemic, and that is expected to change the market for restaurant chains. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast “A Deeper Dive” features Dave Bagley, the managing director of Carl Marks Advisors, to provide an outlook for acquisitions coming out of the pandemic. Bagley leads the restaurant group at the New York-based investment bank and has more than 20 years of experience in corporate finance, operations management, profit improvement and interim management roles.

The Technomic Top 500 Chain Restaurant Report, released earlier this month, has provided a clear picture of just how much the pandemic has influenced the restaurant industry. Joe Pawlak, managing principal with Restaurant Business sister company Technomic, joins this week’s episode of the podcast “A Deeper Dive” to talk about the ranking, including what chains won and what chains lost.

Why are there so few Black and women CEOs? Activist investors. Or so says James White, the former CEO of Jamba, and Thomas Lynch, senior managing director of the private equity firm Mill Road Capital. White recently joined Lynch’s firm to be part of its newly created Progressive Governance Fund, which seeks to improve diversity at smaller companies through targeted investments. White and Lynch argue that activist investors ultimately hurt the long-term value of the restaurant companies they target. But they also argue that activists hurt diversity, frequently by pushing out Black or women CEOs or board members and then nominating mostly white men.

The latest acquisition in Flynn Restaurant Group’s history was its biggest. This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast features Greg Flynn, the giant franchisee’s founder and CEO, who discusses the company’s recent acquisition of most of NPC International’s restaurants. Flynn Restaurant Group has grown over the past couple of decades largely through a series of increasingly large acquisitions. But the purchase of NPC was likely the biggest in U.S. franchise history, essentially merging the two largest franchise operators in the U.S.