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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 also inform them a little bit about Chop Store.

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 trying to be an accountant for about a year and a half, I transitioned into casino property and worked in corporate financing.

I was the first worker there after personal equity bought business. Helped grow that from 20 to 150 areas, took it public in 2014, and then left about a year and a half after going public to do this at Chop Store. My hope is that we can replicate the success we had at Zos, and we're off to an actually great start.

We're at the counter, we bring the food to the table. It is mostly protein bowlsabout 40 percent of the mix. We also do salads, sandwiches. The secret to the program is we have a drink part 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 concepts that are out there, however we think we've got something pretty unique. We're going to add another store this year and at least four shops next year. We will be 31 or so 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 understand, is a leading service provider of software services to the dining establishment and hospitality market. Our objective is to help our customers be successful in driving profitability and being efficientmanaging labor, managing stock, and essentially supplying them with tools they require to deliver their vision.

It's uncommon to have business that are beloved and growing quickly, that can duplicate that success year after year. Jason, among the factors I was so excited to have you join our session is the success at Zos was remarkable. I have actually just satisfied a handful of brands where there was such a strong client affinity for the brand.

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

We're going to talk about how to scale a dining establishment company. Every restaurateur I ever talk with has dreams of taking one store, 2 shops, five stores, and turning it into something much biggerexpanding across the city, throughout the state, into several states, and eventually nationwide, even international reach. But it's not easy, specifically in today's environment.

It's not a simple time to drive success and development at the exact same time. How do you scale it and make it effective? Second, beyond innovation, how do you scale great groups?

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The very first question 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 truly 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 an organization. To me, one of the key things, and I feel extremely lucky, is that both brand names I have actually been included with are special.

And there's nothing exactly like Chop Shop in terms of what we're doing with a large, diverse menu. The majority of brand names today are very singularly focused in regards to what they're using from a food product. I feel like we started at a benefit with both brand names by having something unique that filled a niche nobody else was doing.

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

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The 2nd thingI came from a financing background, so a lot of my learnings are more finance and data-driven versus a lot of early start-up restaurateurs who are imaginative types. They like the food, they constructed the menu, they built the brand. I probably couldn't do that from scratch. If you provided me something that has all those components in location, I can take it from there and put the playbook in place.

They do not know their breakeven sales. They don't understand how margin enhances as sales increase. They do not comprehend cash-on-cash returns. I've seen many companies where the numbers just don't work. And yet individuals say: let's open 10 more. And I'll state: why? It doesn't generate income. Stop. You require to discover a principle that is special.

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If you don't have those two things, you shouldn't be developing shops. Because as I hear your description, you've highlighted 3 things: execution, brand distinction, and monetary viability.

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Second, you require an engaging brand name or distinct idea that resonates with clients. And 3rd, the math needs to work. If you do not understand your system economics, your fixed and variable expenses, you might be broadening blind and losing money. Precisely. And another essential lesson has to do with getting in new markets.

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