Chris Stevenson, Founder of The Empower Group, joins Zack Oates to discuss how memorable guest experiences are built through empowerment, simplicity, and intentional service recovery. Drawing from his background in fitness, hospitality, and speaking, Chris explains why the best experiences leave people feeling better than when they arrived.

Creating Experiences People Remember (3:56)

“If nothing else, be memorable.”

Chris explains that differentiation does not come from features or amenities but from how an experience makes someone feel. Memorable moments turn into stories guests retell, which is where long-term loyalty begins.

Designing Experiences That Feel Better Than Arrival (5:38)

“We wanted people to leave feeling better than when they arrived.”

Chris shares how this mindset shaped his fitness business strategy, focusing on emotional outcomes rather than equipment or programming, and why that approach translates across hospitality industries.

Why Culture Must Start at the Top (6:02)

“The leadership has to demonstrate how important experience really is.”

Chris emphasizes that guest experience only works when leadership models the behavior they expect. Teams take cues from what leaders consistently reinforce.

Using Data to Validate Guest Experience Strategy (6:19)

“Our Net Promoter Score was 77, the highest in the industry at the time.”

Chris explains how measuring experience proved their approach was working and showed that intentional guest focus leads to real business results, not just good intentions.

Easy, Effective, and Enjoyable as a Core Framework (9:13)

“If you make the journey easy, effective, and enjoyable, you hit a home run.”

Chris outlines his three-part framework for evaluating every guest touchpoint and removing friction wherever possible.

Why Empowered Teams Win on Service Recovery (11:33)

“When people are empowered to fix things, they feel better about their jobs.”

Chris explains how empowering employees to resolve issues immediately improves engagement, loyalty, and the guest’s overall perception of the brand.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevensonempowers/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/theempowergroup/about/

https://www.youtube.com/@theempowergroup

Transcript

00:00:00:06 – 00:00:24:15

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give an Ovation, the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I chat with an industry expert to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurant and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:24:21 – 00:00:50:14

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today we have someone on who is just. I heard him speak at Arpa, which is the something, something something amusement park. Something in Orlando. Great event. But I went to his session because it looked so awesome. And I look him up online and he had some, he’s had some incredible experiences. Chris Stevenson, the founder of the empower Group.

00:00:50:16 – 00:01:13:15

Zack Oates

He started off in the health and fitness industry. He owns Stevenson Fitness. He grew that to 2200 members and ended up selling that. Then he went on, and with his whole mentality of guest experience and customer experience. He’s a keynote speaker. He’s a workshop facilitator. He does some incredible things and a fun fact. Chris, your fun fact blew me away.

00:01:13:17 – 00:01:15:19

Zack Oates

Can you share your fun fact with us?

00:01:15:21 – 00:01:31:20

Chris Stevenson

Yeah. So, all through high school, I was a competitive martial artist and I lived in Cleveland, Ohio, and I didn’t have a typical college experience of the fun aspects of that. So I thought, you know what? I’ve done competing, I graduated, I’m going to go some more war and have fun for a few years before I start into my career.

00:01:31:23 – 00:01:49:05

Chris Stevenson

So moved out to the West Coast, got a job at Friday’s, known for their hospitality yesterday. And I was that guy, right. The suspenders, all the flair. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Some people would say it was annoying. Some people say awesome, whatever you choose. But I still training and working out to stay in shape. And I happened to be working out with a couple other guys who worked in the stunt industry.

00:01:49:09 – 00:02:07:13

Chris Stevenson

And one day before my shift at Fridays and I had put the suspenders on, a friend called me and said, can you leave tomorrow for a year long tour of North America? And I said, I don’t know, maybe. He said, come down. We lost a performer. So I went down. I did the worst audition in history, but they were so desperate for a performer that I ended up doing stunts for the children’s show Power Rangers.

00:02:07:15 – 00:02:14:02

Chris Stevenson

So I ended up doing that for 15 years, on and off. Stunts on other movies and television shows. An incredible experience.

00:02:14:04 – 00:02:18:17

Zack Oates

Oh my gosh. Did you ever get injured or are they pretty like the stunts? Pretty tame?

00:02:18:19 – 00:02:33:12

Chris Stevenson

No, especially the live things. You got beat up pretty badly. And when I first started, I didn’t have the skills, so I got hurt even worse because there’s an art to falling in, art that I didn’t know when I started. So a lot of dropped on my head, a lot of big falls on stages and those sort of things.

00:02:33:12 – 00:02:38:11

Chris Stevenson

But you get better at it, you know, throughout the years, and it hurts a little bit less. But there’s always that chance for injury.

00:02:38:13 – 00:02:43:21

Zack Oates

Oh my gosh, wait. So did you end up what’s the live tour? I don’t even know they have that. Yeah.

00:02:43:21 – 00:03:03:00

Chris Stevenson

So this was back in I want to say like 2000 or 2001. I can’t remember if it was. Might have been Fox that owned them at the time and they did an arena show. So you know, when you see coming this weekend to Salt Lakes Center and we would they would block off half the arena, half would be like sort of a playground with bouncy houses and Spider-Man web.

00:03:03:02 – 00:03:13:19

Chris Stevenson

And then, we would do the live shows and it was incredible. And on top of that, you know, we had to do hospital visits, a lot of Make-A-Wish Foundation, which were just experiences that I will always cherish.

00:03:13:23 – 00:03:19:08

Zack Oates

Oh, that is so cool. What a great experience. And like, honestly, such a cool, fun fact.

00:03:19:10 – 00:03:35:14

Chris Stevenson

Yeah, it’s interesting. It’s I’ll tell you one thing. The first presentation I ever did was for Merrill Lynch and it was a high end. Executives was more on the exercise, fitness and wellness side and the organizers of the event knew I had done Power Rangers and they wanted to see my slide deck. So showed them the slide deck.

00:03:35:14 – 00:03:50:18

Chris Stevenson

And they’re like, where’s the Power Rangers slide? And I said, that’s embarrassing. These are high level executives. I’m not putting that in there. Like, trust us, it might be the only thing some of these people remember. And yes, to this day I’ll come across people that are like, hey, you’re the Power Ranger guy. And I’m like, yeah, did you guys look, I was in your session.

00:03:50:18 – 00:03:56:20

Chris Stevenson

I’m like, which one? They’re like, I don’t remember. Manager all right. So if nothing else, be memorable.

00:03:56:22 – 00:04:19:11

Zack Oates

Yeah, I love that. Obviously. Like, what a great take away already is like be memorable. I made a post a little while ago about the power of nostalgia, and we often think about nostalgia as being a historic thing, right? It’s like, oh man, these brands that used to be so cool, like they’ve got some nostalgia to them, but it’s like, what are we doing today to create nostalgia?

00:04:19:11 – 00:04:39:09

Zack Oates

What are we doing today so that a 93 year old woman, decades from now is going to be like, oh man, I want to eat at that restaurant? Because I remember when dot, dot, dot, you got to create those memorable things. And what is your red Power Ranger of your brand like? How do you create that memorable experience to be memorable?

00:04:39:09 – 00:04:51:06

Zack Oates

And actually, which is why I want to dive into a little bit more about what you do currently as the empower Group. Talk to us about what do you do, who do you help and why do people bring you on board?

00:04:51:08 – 00:05:10:24

Chris Stevenson

Gotcha. So you mentioned before that I started off in commercial fitness. And the thing about fitness that’s really interesting is we see people multiple times a week, right. So you have a chance three or 4 or 5 times a week to screw up experiences, to screw up relationships. So it’s one of those industries that, far too often I think people are surprised sometimes when their gym does something nice.

00:05:11:01 – 00:05:32:01

Chris Stevenson

Right? People leave gyms all the time going, I can’t believe they did that. Why? It was dirty or I couldn’t do class, or some influencer was grunting and dropping deadlifts or those sort of thing. So our mantra was always we want people to leave going. I can’t believe they did that in a great way. So we knew when we opened this club that everybody, every gym had treadmills and everyone had dumbbells and everyone had classes and trainers.

00:05:32:04 – 00:05:33:21

Chris Stevenson

So that was never going to differentiate us.

00:05:34:00 – 00:05:36:24

Zack Oates

But we do have Red Power Rangers. Correct. Talk about the.

00:05:36:24 – 00:06:02:22

Chris Stevenson

Difference, skater. That’s why I said good body language, right? Yeah. But, it was one of those things where we knew if we could create this incredible experience that people would leave feeling better than when they arrived, which was our mission statement that we could differentiate herself and be successful. So we took it very strategically. And I think with any organization in hospitality, anyone who serves customers, you got to have a culture that’s wrapped around creating a great experience, and it’s got to come from the top down.

00:06:03:02 – 00:06:19:18

Chris Stevenson

The leadership’s got to demonstrate it. It’s gotta reinforce how important this thing is. And team members need to know that that can be your true differentiator. So we did that. And then we were fortunate enough to participate in the first ever Net Promoter study for the fitness industry. Oh interesting. Yeah they did in the UK first it was the Hfea.

00:06:19:19 – 00:06:39:02

Chris Stevenson

It’s like the National Restaurant Association, but for commercial fitness and they partnered with a software company and they did the first ever Net Promoter Score study. So in that study they did the UK first. And the average Net promoter score was 22. In the US it was 40, ours was 77, literally the highest score in the industry at that time.

00:06:39:04 – 00:06:56:23

Chris Stevenson

So we knew that this strategic approach to member experience was in fact working. So when I did that, I got called actually by the hfea. At the time it went by the name Ursa, and they said, can we interview for a trade journal? Just about some best practices. And I said, sure. So I did this quick little interview and I’m like, I kind of enjoyed that educating and sharing info.

00:06:57:00 – 00:07:11:13

Chris Stevenson

And I said to them, I go, I know you have a conference. Maybe I could speak at it. And they said no. And I was like, oh, I thought I was a shoo. And they said, I mean, you can apply and if we select you. So sure enough, I applied. I eventually did get selected. And then when you speak, other people hear you speak and say, we’d like to bring you to our event.

00:07:11:13 – 00:07:32:11

Chris Stevenson

So it sort of snowballed. And at the time when we still owned and operated health clubs, people reached out after hearing me speak and they said, you consult. And I was like, sure, right. It was like consulting by accident. But as we started to get to work with other organizations and then we started to branch out outside of fitness, into indoor rock climbing, into parks and recreation, the hospitality, amusement, now, all these different industries.

00:07:32:11 – 00:07:51:10

Chris Stevenson

I’m like, I love this because not only, as you mentioned earlier, does creating a great experience. You have all the financial metrics of success, right? You have return visits, people spend more money, they write the good reviews. They were for other customers, which is crucial because we have to have those positive business outcomes. But it’s the right thing to do well.

00:07:51:10 – 00:08:17:14

Chris Stevenson

We can do things where people leave, and their family had this incredible experience that they will talk about, you know, throughout the holidays when they visit family that they want to do this restaurant. And it was so unbelievable. Or they came to this gym and it was so unbelievable or stayed at this hotel. What we do is very powerful, especially in a crazy world where things are all over the place, when we can be that bright spot, and all of us that serve people, whether they’re customers, guests, patrons, whatever you want to call them, and we can make this positive impact.

00:08:17:16 – 00:08:31:24

Chris Stevenson

We’re doing something really special. So yeah. So then at that point when we exited the owning and operating, we opened our company, which is the empower Group, and we do as you mentioned earlier, we speak at events, we do workshops and trainings, and then we do strategic advising for organizations.

00:08:32:01 – 00:08:52:02

Zack Oates

And it was just so great to hear you have such great frameworks that you were using in your sessions. And just like highly recommend people go check out Christy and check out the empower Group. Bring him in. He’s done some incredible content and as I was looking up, there was like everything he was saying, I was like, yeah, I’ve seen that in our data.

00:08:52:02 – 00:09:13:21

Zack Oates

That is 100% true. And even some of the things we’re even getting downplayed a little bit like the power of bringing back a guest is just bananas powerful. That’s just like amazing. So as you’re thinking about some of the tactics, I know you have an entire arsenal of tactics, but what are some tactics that you’ve seen that have worked to improve the guest experience?

00:09:13:22 – 00:09:32:21

Chris Stevenson

So from an overarching standpoint, I always tell people you’re getting three things easy, effective, and enjoyable no matter what sort of organization you have. Again, if it’s a restaurant or hotel, if it’s a barber shop, a salon, a gym, anybody who serves people. If you can make the whole process in the customer journey easy, effective and enjoyable, then you hit a home run.

00:09:33:00 – 00:09:48:00

Chris Stevenson

So basically any touchpoint that somebody interacts with you, what can we do to make it easy? And part of the easy too is we’re seeing technology, for example, in the restaurant industry. And I saw this years ago actually when I was doing work in the UK. But now almost every restaurant brings you the card reader. That makes it easier, right?

00:09:48:00 – 00:10:07:16

Chris Stevenson

As opposed to having to take it saves time. It’s easier, your data safer. So things like that are easy. Or when you can check in digitally for to a hotel those sorts. So it’s got to be easy. And by the way, no matter what industry you’re in, people compare you to experiences in other industries. So using Starbucks as an example, talk about easy load money on your card.

00:10:07:20 – 00:10:14:08

Chris Stevenson

Order it. Do you want to order the same thing from the same place? Here’s some fireworks because you tip like they make it so easy. People want that.

00:10:14:11 – 00:10:21:05

Zack Oates

But Chris, I’m not Starbucks. I can’t afford that app so customers aren’t comparing me to Starbucks, right?

00:10:21:11 – 00:10:39:09

Chris Stevenson

Wrong. They aren’t comparing, you know? But to be fair, for example, we do a lot of work in park and recreation, and it’s an incredible industry that does so many good things for communities. A lot of red tape, a lot of situations where the software super clunky or a registration process is terrible or they can’t get an app or the app that they have is just so inadequate.

00:10:39:11 – 00:10:54:04

Chris Stevenson

So with them, I say, well, what it’s always about, what can’t we do? It’s what can we do? So your staff being trained on how to make things more efficient, how to answer questions quickly, how to be empowered to for service recovery. So there are things from the human standpoint where if you just can’t afford an app, fine.

00:10:54:10 – 00:10:59:17

Chris Stevenson

But what can we do through our processes that we can actually have an impact app to make things easier?

00:10:59:19 – 00:11:33:13

Zack Oates

And I love that empowerment through service recovery. We’ve seen that where by giving employees the opportunity to like give someone a $510 gift card that allows them to then feel like they are contributing to making someone’s day, they’re contributing to making something right. And what’s this very interesting paradox of when you give people, when you and your verbiage empower them to make and create a great guest experience, they actually are going to be more loyal to you because they like how that feels for them.

00:11:33:15 – 00:11:51:21

Chris Stevenson

Yep, 100%. And we’re in an era where employee engagement is a huge challenge. But again, when you’re putting people in a position to make plays and make people happy, they’re more engaged when they’re empowered because staff will feel dumb if they can’t handle stuff. So if they’ve got to be like, I’ll try, let me go find somebody that already makes them feel stupid.

00:11:51:23 – 00:12:10:10

Chris Stevenson

So to your point, not only are they more engaged and loyal, they feel better about what they’re doing because they’re empowered to make these decisions. And I hear this from some people, especially owners and operators, where they like. Yeah, but were terrified. If we empower them, they’re going to give away the farm. I can tell you, with the owning and operating clubs for 20 years, I never had a team member who was empowered give away.

00:12:10:12 – 00:12:19:14

Chris Stevenson

They almost on the side of not giving away as much as you might as the owner, right to solve a problem, so it might feel like a reward they’re going to give away. They never do, they just never do.

00:12:19:17 – 00:12:39:19

Zack Oates

And the benefit is if you give someone a $5 gift card and you’re average ticket is $10 just for simple math, right, they are going to have a ticket of $17. They’re going to spend $7 more. If you give them a $5 coupon. So it’s like you’re not losing because you get the margins in the other $2 that you give up in the five.

00:12:40:00 – 00:13:03:00

Zack Oates

And so you’re just getting an extra visit and a guest recovered and a happier employee who’s more engaged. It just is win win win all around. And in fact, I had on the head of public relations for Domino’s on the podcast, and we were talking about how if there is a hundred people that complain, how many people are actively trying to rip you off.

00:13:03:02 – 00:13:16:03

Zack Oates

And when you look at the numbers, it’s genuinely less than one. Yep. So if you have less than 1% trying to rip you off, why are you treating the other 99% like they’re that 1% agree?

00:13:16:03 – 00:13:20:24

Chris Stevenson

And one thing that’s really interesting with the department store Nordstrom known for their high levels of service.

00:13:21:01 – 00:13:27:16

Zack Oates

They thank you for dropping the s on the end of that. It’s not Nordstrom’s Nordstrom. Thank you. Yep okay keep going up.

00:13:27:18 – 00:13:45:12

Chris Stevenson

But with them you know most places have a limit of two items. When you go to a changing room. Nordstrom does not because they’re like you know what 99% of our people never try to steal anything. So why would we inconvenience 99% of our people with a rule that’s really geared to the small percentage? Now, if they catch somebody, they’re going to take action as they should.

00:13:45:12 – 00:13:59:15

Chris Stevenson

Somebody is stealing from you, right? So it’s one of those things that when you’re thinking about your customer service guidelines and all those different things, don’t punish the small percentage to your point, right. You want to make sure that you’re catering to the majority and then deal with the little percentage the other time.

00:13:59:17 – 00:14:21:04

Zack Oates

Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s such a powerful concept. And really it gets to the fact of like give people the benefit of the doubt until they give you reason enough to doubt the benefit. Right. And I think that’s where it comes down to how do we think about customer experience experiences. So with that in mind, when you think about customer experience nowadays, what do you feel are some of the most important aspects?

00:14:21:04 – 00:14:24:22

Zack Oates

What are guests looking for? What is the modern guest looking for?

00:14:24:24 – 00:14:41:11

Chris Stevenson

So I think we’re in an era of hyper personalization. People want your attention. They want your undivided attention. They want it to be treated special, especially with the advantages in technology that are making certain things easier. If somebody is going to go to, let’s say, a retail store, they serve customers, right. So you’ve got to create a great experience there.

00:14:41:13 – 00:14:54:08

Chris Stevenson

Somebody can just get it on Amazon. Matter of fact, they can order five similar things, send four back for free. Keep the one they want. So if they come into your retail store, it means they want an experience. They want to be there. They want to touch. They want to feel that they they want to be treated well.

00:14:54:11 – 00:15:06:01

Chris Stevenson

Right. So I think people are really looking for an elevated experience in most industries where it’s personalized, where they feel like a VIP and where they feel absolutely like they are the center of the universe when they interact with your organization.

00:15:06:03 – 00:15:30:09

Zack Oates

And I think that personalization extends really to every facet of the business, but especially when something goes wrong, like we’re talking about with the recovery. And that’s one of the reasons why it’s like AI is getting really, really good. In fact, like for example, the ovation AI is 10% better at winning back guests than humans, which is great, but it still needs that human touch.

00:15:30:09 – 00:15:52:21

Zack Oates

It still needs the ability to be able to get in there and build that relationship and create that true connection. It will be another couple of generations, if ever, before someone is saying, I don’t want human connection, I just want I. I think people still want to be able to shake someone’s hand, look someone in the whites of the eyes and say, and here, thank you.

00:15:52:23 – 00:16:09:15

Chris Stevenson

100%. It’s funny, I actually last week hosted two webinars on AI. The reason I hosted it was because I know my lane and I am not a tech or I expert. I know what I’m you know, know what you’re good at, know your lanes, customer experience, leadership, employee engagement. Yes. Tech I know some I’m like but I’ll hosted because I’ll get to learn.

00:16:09:21 – 00:16:28:20

Chris Stevenson

But it was funny after listening to these experts, to your point about still wanting some human interaction, I kind of thought, you know what, listen, I will never replace you, but organizations that utilize AI to its potential will replace you. It’s like in the old days. What should I be on social now? It’s not it changed from should I be on there to I need to be on there and how well do I use it?

00:16:28:23 – 00:16:44:01

Chris Stevenson

Same thing with AI technology. You’ve got to adopt these things get. They are going to make a better experience. They’re part of that easy, effective and enjoyable coupled with the human interaction. On a funny side note is have you heard of Kalahari? It’s an indoor water park. And yes, yes. So by the way, it’s never been in my life.

00:16:44:01 – 00:17:02:20

Chris Stevenson

And last year I spoke at two conferences back to back in Kalahari. I was like, wow, never been in my whole life. And then I was within one week in two different states in Kalahari, but they had the check in kiosks at the hotel part of it. Yeah. They also had people roaming around. So somebody like me went up there to try to check in and because I’m technologically challenged, was struggling a little bit.

00:17:02:20 – 00:17:16:05

Chris Stevenson

But somebody saw me. They must have noticed my body language. They were taught to own questions and came over, said, sir, you look like you might need a little help. How can I help you? Oh, it’s really easy. You just do this. So to your point, the kiosk was great. Once I had a little assistance because I needed it at the time.

00:17:16:11 – 00:17:33:05

Chris Stevenson

That made for a great experience and I do think with service recovery, as funny as it is, is sometimes that’s the biggest memory that people have when something goes wrong and then they tell the story about how quickly and effectively you fixed it. I had a colleague once say, yeah, I think sometimes staff should make a mistake on purpose just so we could fix it and really delight a member.

00:17:33:05 – 00:17:42:11

Chris Stevenson

I was, well, I wouldn’t go that far. Don’t make mistakes on purpose, but sometimes really service recovery. When you empower your staff and they can handle it right away, people leave talking about how great that was.

00:17:42:13 – 00:18:04:01

Zack Oates

Oh, I mean, our data shows that a recovered guest is worth 24 times more than your average guest in terms of like what dollars they bring in the door. I mean, it’s just monumental. It’s huge. So I’ve loved this conversation, man. I feel like we could talk for hours about this because you have so many great experiences, but how can people find and follow you?

00:18:04:03 – 00:18:19:13

Chris Stevenson

So our website is TG firm.com. That’s the empower. So TG firm.com. You can go there. My handle on Instagram is the Chris Stevenson. Not because I am the Chris Stevenson because for Stevenson was taken so people are like oh really. You know like I.

00:18:19:14 – 00:18:19:23

Zack Oates

Swear to.

00:18:19:23 – 00:18:38:21

Chris Stevenson

You we’ll see this after like Chris Stevenson 7897. So yeah, yeah the Chris Stevenson was better. And then it’s the underscore empower underscore group. So you can follow myself and that and then LinkedIn just search Chris Stevenson okay. And when that I’m really quickly what you do and with ovation is I wrote an article several years back called feel versus real.

00:18:38:23 – 00:18:55:05

Chris Stevenson

And especially when it comes to customer experience, sometimes we feel like we’re doing the right stuff, like we’re trying and we’re doing these sort of things. But what you’re doing is so valuable because the data tells you what’s real. You might think this is a great idea, but when you’re like, nope, we’ve got all the data points, here’s what they’ll spend or here’s what the real problems are.

00:18:55:05 – 00:19:11:09

Chris Stevenson

We think most people are unhappy with this. Oh no, they’re not. What the data shows is here’s what they’re actually unhappy about. When you have tools like you have that you can utilize to really provide data so you can make decisions based on real instead of feel. That’s where the real success at especially member and customer and guest experience.

00:19:11:11 – 00:19:20:13

Zack Oates

Amen. I love that real versus feel. By the way, last question who is someone that we should be following? Who’s someone that you look up to in the guest experience industry?

00:19:20:15 – 00:19:37:04

Chris Stevenson

You know, it’s interesting. I saw the book as soon as we logged on above your shoulder about unreasonable hospitality. Obviously read the book and saw will present at the fitness conference HFA. And you know, it’s funny. Normally I’ll hear a keynote and then go read the book. This was one of those opposite things where I had read the book, and I’m like, well, how entertaining could the keynote be?

00:19:37:04 – 00:19:44:00

Chris Stevenson

And it was still just absolutely off the charts. So I think Will is one of my absolute favorite follows.

00:19:44:02 – 00:20:02:06

Zack Oates

I love him and for anyone who hasn’t listened to it, go listen to the podcast that I did with him. He came on and just I mean, crush it. I don’t think I’ve ever been that nervous in my life. Then meeting Will Guidara like I was such a fan boy. And anyway, he so the worst hosting experience I’ve ever had.

00:20:02:06 – 00:20:05:06

Zack Oates

But he is awesome. So go check out that podcast.

00:20:05:06 – 00:20:06:16

Chris Stevenson

I thought it was a pretty good episode by the way.

00:20:06:16 – 00:20:18:15

Zack Oates

I did listen to it so they’ll be hard on itself. Oh well. Thank you. Well, Chris, for showing us how to power up our guest experience. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and giving ovation. All right.

00:20:18:15 – 00:20:20:05

Chris Stevenson

Thanks I appreciate it Zach.

00:20:20:07 – 00:20:42:19

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation ABC.com.

Carl shares why the most successful applications of AI focus on supporting teams, improving consistency, and removing friction rather than replacing people.

Why AI Needs to Be Practical (1:42)

“AI only works if it makes someone’s job easier.”

Carl explains that AI adoption fails when it is implemented for novelty instead of utility. The most effective tools solve real operational problems and help teams focus on what matters most in the guest experience.

AI Should Support People, Not Replace Them (4:10)

“The goal isn’t fewer people, it’s better outcomes.”

Carl emphasizes that AI should amplify human effort rather than eliminate it. When used correctly, technology allows teams to spend more time on hospitality and less time on repetitive tasks.

Removing Friction for Restaurant Teams (6:35)

“If you remove friction for employees, guests feel it immediately.”

Carl shares how reducing operational friction behind the scenes leads directly to better guest interactions. When teams are less stressed and more focused, service quality naturally improves.

Consistency Is Where AI Shines (9:02)

“AI helps you do the basics well every single day.”

Consistency is one of the hardest challenges in multi unit restaurants. Carl explains how AI can help standardize execution across locations without stripping away brand personality.

Avoiding the AI Hype Trap (11:28)

“Not every problem needs an AI solution.”

Carl cautions operators against chasing trends. Successful brands start with clear problems and adopt technology only when it meaningfully improves operations or guest experience.

Using AI to Elevate the Guest Experience (14:06)

“When teams are supported, guests feel taken care of.”

Carl ties everything back to the guest. When AI helps teams operate more smoothly, it creates space for better hospitality, stronger connections, and more memorable experiences.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/carlorsbourn/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/invisible-technologies-inc-/about/

https://invisibletech.ai/

Transcript

00:00:00:10 – 00:00:26:11

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give An Ovation, the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I chat with industry experts to get their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by Ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-day restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurant and exactly what to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:26:17 – 00:00:52:06

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today we have a first because we have a third. Carl Osborne joins us today. This is his third time on the podcast. And I am so excited because every time I chat with him it is just new stuff. He is so ingrained into what will be happening and what is happening in restaurants.

00:00:52:06 – 00:01:10:18

Zack Oates

And so Carl, welcome to the podcast. And you’re joining us right now, not only as a bestselling author for multiple books, a podcast host, a thought leader, but also as the SVP over at invisible. So welcome to the podcast again.

00:01:10:20 – 00:01:30:15

Carl Orsbourn

Thank you. Zach. I have to say, out of all the podcasts I join, your introduction is always the most dynamic and energized. If you’re not ready and excited to go, I mean, this is not the right podcast because I just love listening to your voice. Mind you, if you if ovation fails miserably, which it won’t, but if it does, if it does, your future and radio is secure, my friend.

00:01:30:19 – 00:01:51:02

Zack Oates

Because my goodness, if only though I had the boyish good looks of Carl and the accent because by the way, he did let me know. Because I always think that. Carl, for those of you who haven’t seen a picture of him, he looks like a good 5 to 7 years younger than me. And turns out he’s actually like nine years older than me.

00:01:51:07 – 00:01:58:23

Zack Oates

And so I asked him what the fountain of youth. And he informed me that it is just growing up without southern England, right?

00:01:59:00 – 00:02:07:18

Carl Orsbourn

That’s right. Maybe it’s also the lack of children in my life. Maybe that’s another factor, I guess. I hear you don’t get as much sleep as I do, so maybe it’s the beauty sleep that maybe comes back to us.

00:02:07:20 – 00:02:09:22

Zack Oates

Now familiar with this? This is like a kind of food.

00:02:09:22 – 00:02:16:03

Carl Orsbourn

Is this you’ve got you’ve got the whole family, and then you’re running a company. And so you’ve got two kind of whammies right there, my friend.

00:02:16:04 – 00:02:31:24

Zack Oates

Well, that’s why I do it the Utah way, which is 44oz of Diet Coke every or excuse me, Coke Zero every lunch. So that’s how we roll it. So, Carl, for those who don’t know, tell me a little bit about invisible. What is it and what attracted you to this company?

00:02:32:01 – 00:02:52:08

Carl Orsbourn

Yeah. Invisible is a ten year old coming. It’s a scale up more than a startup. It it’s something like 130 million in revenue. Last year, it’s been ranked as the second fastest growing AI company in the US. And it’s known primarily for training 80% of the world’s large language models. So you can think of the ChatGPT is the Geminis of this world.

00:02:52:14 – 00:03:16:20

Carl Orsbourn

Somehow these models were had to be built and trained over a number of years to be to the level that they are performing today. So our team were that right at the very beginning, the very first iteration of GVC invisible was supporting the the open AI folks. It’s a really interesting business because I, of course, is at the precipice of what is going to change all of our lives right now.

00:03:16:20 – 00:03:48:02

Carl Orsbourn

And so my role at the business is less on the kind of AI training model side that I just explained, but more about helping consumer facing businesses with bringing AI into the enterprise. And one of the things I often say to folks is that there’s so much hype, there’s so much hyperbole about this. And actually, when you look at the data and Gartner came out with some data recently that said something like 95%, 95% of all gen AI pilots that were launched in the last 12 months have failed to scale.

00:03:48:04 – 00:04:02:20

Zack Oates

Oh, interesting. That sounds like my dating life. How many first dates ended up in second? Not very many. And I was like, maybe we just give up on it. But it was about finding the right combination, not about just like doing it. Right.

00:04:02:22 – 00:04:21:17

Carl Orsbourn

That’s it. But also in the context of the AI story rather than the zaccheaus love story. Maybe it’s true on both counts, right? You got to start with the end in mind. And actually a lot of the businesses these days, we’ve got a lot of pressure, whether it be from the investor groups, the shareholders, the boards saying, look, we’ve got to be doing something with AI.

00:04:21:18 – 00:04:58:06

Carl Orsbourn

And so they bring something and they deploy something very quickly. And then what happens is the thing isn’t really measured particularly well. Maybe it’s been built on a shaky data foundation, and there is really someone champing at believing that this is going to be something that can differentiate the business. And so what we do is we’re a partner organization to the series of modules, and we basically structured data in its first instance with where we take structured and unstructured data, unify it into a platform that basically takes data through a medallion architecture from raw data where it doesn’t make much sense to actually clean it at all, to then a place where we actually can

00:04:58:06 – 00:05:24:13

Carl Orsbourn

derive insights. And then we take that into a module called atomic, which is a process builder. So you think of any digital workflow, whether it be invoice management, whether it be onboarding an emotion or procurement or some form of closure to your finance, financial books, any of those digital processes that exist. There are lots of steps. But here’s the thing that’s quite unique about us, in the sense that we are not a platform that works off the shelf.

00:05:24:13 – 00:05:52:21

Carl Orsbourn

We custom build everything around an organization’s current stack. So we’re not about replacing a CRM or an ERP or anything like that. We’re about working alongside it. So atomic is a process builder that outlines the steps necessary in an optimal fashion to work alongside the current tech stack. But then also we’ve got another module which is Radial Marketplace, which has something like 20,000 people around the world that are working to help us either train models or play a role.

00:05:52:22 – 00:06:10:08

Carl Orsbourn

A human in the loop is necessary alongside those digital workflows. And so that is kind of important because anyone that’s selling you anything which says AI does it all and you don’t have to worry about any humans. That’s also one of the fallacies. Humans are still very, very important as much as anything for risk mitigation, quality assurance and building.

00:06:10:08 – 00:06:17:08

Zack Oates

I love, by the way, what Tony Robbins says about that. He goes, I isn’t going to replace you. Someone that understands AI is going to replace you, right?

00:06:17:12 – 00:06:22:06

Carl Orsbourn

Yeah, well, Tony stole that from Harvard, and they know a thing about him, right? Yeah. All.

00:06:22:06 – 00:06:28:15

Zack Oates

The Tony DVDs that Tony Robbins didn’t doesn’t come up with all his own original material. Come on now, Carl.

00:06:28:17 – 00:06:50:21

Carl Orsbourn

He probably said it better than than him with that, with his booming voice. Right? I mean, he was probably far more compelling. Let’s, so you build out these, these workflows, but then you’ve got this piece that’s getting everyone’s attention right now, and that’s, our modules called axon, the genetic workflows. And this is like, you know, if I was pitching this business to you right now, Zach, I’d be bringing up this demo that we have, which we we should have an insurance claim.

00:06:50:21 – 00:07:05:14

Carl Orsbourn

It’s just so dynamic to watch it happen in front of you. But imagine you’re running, I don’t know, like, say, an insurance business. Right. And you’ve got a you’re doing all the claims and we know what it’s like. Everyone’s had a car accident. The length of time it takes to be able to get your money back after a car accident.

00:07:05:16 – 00:07:22:18

Carl Orsbourn

Well, what we’re doing with the genetic workflows is helping all of those workflows happen concurrent to each other. So in one corner, you’ll see the video of the car acts that are happening, the other you’ll see the 911 call being analyzed. We all, you’ll see the actual website being looked at for the regular use of, accidents happening on that particular intersection.

00:07:22:23 – 00:07:47:02

Carl Orsbourn

And all these things are working together as specific agents to then be able to tell a overarching story. Why then these agents, collaborate with each other and tell a human look, should we approve this claim or not? So you think about it from that angle. We get to a place where you then say, well, if we can start to apply AI in this world, then we move it away from the conversation that many people are having right now.

00:07:47:07 – 00:08:04:12

Carl Orsbourn

And it’s the thing that causes most fear and that is is AI going to take my job? And I think it’s a really interesting question because they’re of course going to probably be disruptions in the same way as before the dishwasher existed. There were people washing all the dishes, and then what happened was not like we lost people in our restaurants, right?

00:08:04:12 – 00:08:06:22

Carl Orsbourn

Like when AMD did other roles.

00:08:06:24 – 00:08:30:12

Zack Oates

Yeah, like I was actually just watching a show that was taking place in the early 1900s or the. Yeah, like the 1920s. And it showed like all these switchboard operators, like rooms full of these people that were switchboard operators and like they moved on and they found other jobs. There’s still more jobs to be done. And the fact that the phones created then more jobs of receptionists.

00:08:30:12 – 00:08:32:22

Zack Oates

Right. That wasn’t really a thing before.

00:08:32:24 – 00:09:00:24

Carl Orsbourn

Absolutely. Yeah. And if you approach I mean, in fact, I always say my biggest challenges in this business are either the inertia within the enterprise customers to see where this can potentially head or their willingness to take the gambling, moving this direction or the imagination to see what this really can do. Because if you think about this through the lens of what can I do with ten less people in my team, then you’re missing the opportunity of thinking, what would I do if I had a thousand more people?

00:09:00:24 – 00:09:20:09

Carl Orsbourn

It might say, oh, oh, right. And when you look at when we put this to a big dairy farm up in your part of the world and if you’d have thought about it as to how to run his farm with tell us people, we would have never got to where we got to because we said, if you can run your business with a thousand more people, where would you put those thousand people?

00:09:20:11 – 00:09:47:20

Carl Orsbourn

And he said, would I care about the welfare of my cows? And what I really want to be able to do is have more eyes on my cows. So we’ve developed a computer vision swarm drone kind of division, which is basically assessing these cows to see are they eating correctly? Are they displaying some early signs of infection. So that way he can then turn his human team on to care for those cows faster, and stopping them from being larger issues and ultimately improving the yield of this kind of farming activity.

00:09:47:20 – 00:10:02:00

Carl Orsbourn

Okay, that’s the kind of thing you can do with a thousand more people, right? So that’s part of the challenge in my role, Zach is helping people just open their eyes to different perspectives of how I really is going to transform and ultimately build differentiation into their offering.

00:10:02:02 – 00:10:30:13

Zack Oates

So I’m a brand, and I look at all these other huge things that were supposed to be NFTs. I look at the Segway, I look at these huge promises of, this is going to be the next frontier. And it didn’t quite match up. What is the difference? How do we prevent AI from being a pun intended segway into a flop versus a gateway into the future?

00:10:30:15 – 00:10:51:05

Carl Orsbourn

Yeah, that’s a good question, right? Because we’ve we’ve lived through a few in recent years and you mentioned a few there, but I think the evidence ultimately comes from seeing it in action and seen folks actually starting to deploy it. And we run across a number of different sectors, including the public sector and certainly industries that you could say are probably a little further advanced than the restaurant space.

00:10:51:07 – 00:11:19:14

Carl Orsbourn

But I think when you do that, you start to see some of the things that are being put in place right now and actually have been for for a little bit now, which are really driving forward adoption in that space. So I don’t think this is a question of if, but more a question of when. And the reason for that is that ultimately this is something that can allow us to do things at a velocity and at a pace and at a quality that we’ve never been able to do before.

00:11:19:16 – 00:11:42:08

Carl Orsbourn

But look, our space is a little different. You and I were doing another video thing recently where we were talking about how does this kind of thing affect the guest experience, and how does it really make customers feel about it. And I don’t know about you, but anytime I answer all of those phone calls and it’s one of those robotic voices telling me to press one or press two, it’s not as good as when I’m actually speaking to someone.

00:11:42:14 – 00:12:06:18

Carl Orsbourn

And I think ultimately where we need to think about AI in the hospitality sector at large is how do we create a better guest experience by allowing the humans that are involved in that to either be better prepared to art, to be able to create a better experience, or indeed to be able to ensure that they have the time and the utility to be able to do just that.

00:12:06:18 – 00:12:27:10

Carl Orsbourn

I you know, when I speak to operators, for example, in restaurant groups, I say I and I haven’t met one operator yet. That doesn’t say to me the best in my restaurants all the gems that spend the most amount of time with their team and or the best amount of time with their guests. And so then you ask, well, what about the other 90%?

00:12:27:12 – 00:12:43:20

Carl Orsbourn

And they say, well, they typically are using their time as effectively, or they’re being caught up with spending their time in the office doing tasks in front of the computer, or having to deal with lots of recruitment challenges or things like that. And that’s all I understand it, but let’s just operate in life. But then that’s the question mark.

00:12:43:20 – 00:12:56:00

Carl Orsbourn

I would then put to say, well, what can we do to get the GM out of the office? What can we do to. And yeah, I mean, even the customers more. Right. And that’s the kind of stuff that then we allow the humans to do what they do best. And that’s creating the best customer experiences.

00:12:56:02 – 00:13:21:04

Zack Oates

Because at the end of the day, it’s about connection, right? We could do everything else that we want, but it’s about connection. And like if there’s a brand that delivers every single time and it’s exactly the same, I could trust that brand. But if I have a negative experience with that brand, what am I going to do? First thing I do is I’m going to go try someone else and I’m going to see, is there anyone else who can do it better?

00:13:21:06 – 00:13:46:24

Zack Oates

And if there’s that connection, that is what creates true loyalty, more so than anything else that we can do. And the data proves it. In fact, a guest who has experienced real connection, which the best time to initiate that connection is actually right after a negative experience. If you have proper service recovery, that guest is 24 times more valuable than your average guest.

00:13:47:01 – 00:14:12:09

Zack Oates

They’re twice as likely to come back. They spend $5 more on each subsequent visit. Their frequency is two and a half times the average guest, and they’re 12 times more likely to leave you a five star review. So that connection is critical. But now it’s so it’s about what can I do to help enable that connection better. And the way that I’ve always looked at technology in hospitality is like the Tony Stark suit.

00:14:12:11 – 00:14:42:23

Zack Oates

It’s the Iron Man suit that makes Tony Stark a superhero. He’s just Tony Stark. He puts on the suit and he’s Iron Man, and that’s that simpatico right there of human and technology, I think, is what we need to do to help our people become the superheroes that they want to be. And then it’s about hiring the people who want to be out in the front, who don’t want to be at the computer, because those people technology can do the computer stuff for them.

00:14:43:03 – 00:15:03:19

Zack Oates

But looking someone in the whites of their eyes and saying, Carl, I’m glad you came in, or let me fix that for you, or answering a guest when they have a unique response that a unique complaint that that needs to be addressed by a human. Those are things that you need those individuals to do and that only they can do.

00:15:03:21 – 00:15:41:16

Zack Oates

And that’s how technology helps, not replaces. And I love that idea of flipping it around to how can I do this with less, with ten fewer people, as opposed to what would I do with a thousand more people? I mean, what a powerful question to ask. And I think something that each of us in our restaurant should be looking at and working with our vendors, working with our partners to not only share what you’re doing with AI, but also like ask them what’s on your roadmap and work with your vendors, because I’ll tell you, every single vendor that you are working with right now is investing heavily into AI.

00:15:41:16 – 00:16:05:00

Zack Oates

The question is, are you investing into having the infrastructure to adapt and adopt that AI? Because if not, what’s the good of having that vendor? You’re paying them not just for the service, but you’re paying them for the innovation. I’ve got a whole team of people that are building stuff that no one is paying for yet, and things that we’re not even going to be charging for just to make the product better.

00:16:05:02 – 00:16:20:14

Zack Oates

So, like I ask everyone, reach out to your vendors and make sure that you’re using it because I bet you 95% of restaurants are using half of what they are currently paying for that the vendors have built.

00:16:20:16 – 00:16:46:11

Carl Orsbourn

If not more. Yeah, if not more. I agree it’s and also, to what degree are those vendors actually listening to you to be able to adapt their product appropriately to fit your business? One of the big question marks right now that’s quite central, I think, to all of this, is we’ve been blessed in many ways as an industry, in many industries that are customer facing, to have had SAS these last ten, 15 years or so.

00:16:46:11 – 00:17:05:13

Carl Orsbourn

Right, which has enabled a lot of smaller businesses to be able to get access to capabilities that have allowed them to do things that before just impossible for a company of that size. But what’s happened also as a result of that is that we’ve created a situation whereby a lot of these SAS systems are not talking to each other.

00:17:05:15 – 00:17:29:02

Carl Orsbourn

And so therefore what we have in our arms now is a tech stack that isn’t really working in cahoots with each other. One of the big use cases around AI is demand forecasting. But you ask any restaurant executive how many demand forecasts actually exist in your business right now? And many of them will say, well, I’ve got one working with my labor faster.

00:17:29:04 – 00:17:47:01

Carl Orsbourn

I’ve got another thing have been to help me make sure I’ve got the right inventory in place. My business development team are thinking about this forecasting. The finance team are building the projections in this way. And so you suddenly said, well, hold on a second. Your operating your business of all these different forecasts. And it makes sense because they were operating off different systems at different iterations.

00:17:47:03 – 00:18:09:17

Carl Orsbourn

But the one thing that’s going to make a fail is that if the data isn’t right, and if you take bad data into a fight with good AI, the data will win every single time. And so one of the challenges that I think we’re going to run up against is how much are we going to find our ability as executives in this industry to really make sure our data can work across channels?

00:18:09:19 – 00:18:30:16

Carl Orsbourn

And this is more than just APIs, by the way. This is about having a holistic, interdependent system which allows a way for these data points to collaborate. So let me give you an example. I have this vision of us building this tool, which I’d love to call something like small GM, right. Something which allows us to really build on the hustle of great GM’s out there.

00:18:30:16 – 00:18:56:09

Carl Orsbourn

And today the great GM’s have the ability to see, to hear, to have the pulse of exactly what’s happening to their operation and make adjustments in that moment. But there are lots of things that they might not be aware of. So let’s give you an example. Let’s say you’re running a restaurant tonight. Zach and two of your cooks have just called out one of your refrigerators, and one of the predictive sensors in it is suggesting that the fridge might actually go down and fail within the next week.

00:18:56:11 – 00:19:07:20

Carl Orsbourn

And also, there’s a snowstorm coming through this evening. Now, there’s three different pieces of Intel, are things that the GM sometimes has to adjust to. But imagine if there was a smart GM AI.

00:19:07:20 – 00:19:15:07

Zack Oates

System that can just say, hey, get out of the restaurant industry. It’s too hard. Is that what is that what the system would do.

00:19:15:09 – 00:19:17:01

Carl Orsbourn

If we could just say that would be good, right? Yeah.

00:19:17:01 – 00:19:19:14

Zack Oates

92 imagine if.

00:19:19:14 – 00:19:37:17

Carl Orsbourn

It was able to say, don’t worry, I’ve hired the technician within the budget constraints that you’re after. They’re coming tomorrow during your off peak period. I actually think you need to move Susan across the beat tonight because typically you have higher delivery transactions when we get this kind of weather through, and you’ll probably have less people needing to be at the front because there’ll be less traffic coming in.

00:19:37:19 – 00:19:53:22

Carl Orsbourn

And also, I sent a message to the three people in your neighborhood store two miles away, who’ve got three part time workers that have made a request for extra hours. And actually, if you bring them over, that will cover up your shortfall. Imagine that GM having that type of capability. And are they going yes, yes, yes, that’s really helpful.

00:19:53:22 – 00:20:10:24

Carl Orsbourn

Or be able to be involved and engage with us. And actually I don’t want that person to ask somebody, well, this person because they’re an ex-girlfriend or whatever, but that type of interaction then, so it’s not just a prompt, but it’s actually an ability for the GM to be able to engage and to offer recommendations. That’s the world we’re heading towards.

00:20:11:01 – 00:20:17:06

Carl Orsbourn

But you can only do that when you start to tie these data threads together, where these things will start to play good with each other.

00:20:17:08 – 00:20:35:18

Zack Oates

Well, that is so powerful. And Carl, there’s so much that we could talk about here. We’ve just barely scratching the surface here. It’s a spoonful out of your ocean of wisdom and knowledge on AI. And so I appreciate you coming on and chat with us for a little bit. How can people find and follow you if there is, by chance, someone who doesn’t know you?

00:20:35:20 – 00:20:54:07

Carl Orsbourn

Well, I always link to this. My home is as many people that do know me know. So reach out to me on LinkedIn. Be mindful of that rather odd son, I move mine, it’s OSB and of course you can if you haven’t read the books yet and they’re both on Amazon, deliver in the digital restaurant to help you get some ideas as to what’s happening in the world of off premises and technology.

00:20:54:09 – 00:21:03:00

Zack Oates

Awesome. Well, Karl, for making the future where robots take over the world a little less scary. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us. I’m giving ovation.

00:21:03:02 – 00:21:04:18

Carl Orsbourn

Thank you Zach, nice to see.

00:21:04:20 – 00:21:27:07

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation up.com.

Brian Fauver, Partner at Hargett Hunter Capital Management, joins Zack Oates to share how investors evaluate restaurant brands through the lens of guest experience. Drawing from nearly two decades of investing in hospitality, Brian explains why authenticity, hospitality, and emotional connection matter just as much as unit economics when building brands that last.

Why Restaurants Are Worth the Risk (1:26)

“I got a taste of how loyalty is created inside the four walls, and I couldn’t get enough.”

Brian explains that while restaurants are often viewed as a challenging investment category, the emotional connection guests form with brands makes them compelling. Early exposure to restaurant investing showed him how powerful loyalty can be when the experience truly resonates.

What Investors Look for Beyond Unit Economics (2:43)

“Unit economics matter, but that’s not the end all be all for us.”

Brian shares that financial performance is only the starting point. Hagen Hunter looks for concepts that are approachable, clearly differentiated, and built around a strong reason for existing. Brands designed for broad appeal tend to create stronger guest relationships.

Why Authenticity Cannot Be Faked (3:51)

“You know it when you see it, and when you do, it’s really powerful.”

Authenticity is central to Brian’s investment philosophy. He explains that the most compelling brands are rooted in genuine stories and cultures that guests can feel immediately. That emotional clarity is difficult to replicate and critical for long term success.

The Difference Between Service and Hospitality (7:20)

“Hospitality is how it makes you feel, not just what gets done.”

Brian distinguishes operational execution from true hospitality. While service ensures tasks are completed, hospitality focuses on creating memorable feelings. Brands that intentionally design moments of warmth and care tend to leave a lasting impression.

Creating Meaningful Guest Interactions (10:18)

“It’s about increasing the intensity of connection, not just the volume.”

Brian discusses how some brands go beyond transactions to build relationships. Personalized outreach and unexpected gestures help deepen guest loyalty and extend engagement beyond a single visit.

Why Feedback Protects the Brand (12:16)

“You’re only as good as your last experience.”

Guest feedback acts as an early warning system. Brian explains that while mistakes are inevitable, brands that listen and respond quickly can recover trust and prevent long term damage to guest relationships.

Who Deserves an Ovation? (15:22)

Brian gives an ovation to leadership teams within his portfolio who are opening their first locations in new markets. He highlights the discipline and care required to expand thoughtfully and praises the operators leading those efforts.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-fauver-1639471/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/hargett-hunter/about/

https://hargetthunter.com/

Transcript

00:00:00:12 – 00:00:26:07

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give an Ovation at the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I get to chat with an industry expert to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-day restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurant and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:26:08 – 00:00:51:06

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today I’m really excited because we have Brian Farber here who is a partner at Hagen Hunter Capital Management. Go check out their website to see their portfolios. But they got a ton of different restaurants on there. One of my favorite. Maria Gama udon. What a cool brand. And also love me some chop shop there in, every time I go to Arizona.

00:00:51:10 – 00:01:00:18

Zack Oates

Got to get some chop shop anyway, but along with a ton of other brands and you’re doing some great stuff, Brian, and excited to chat with you about the guest experience in restaurants. And welcome to the podcast.

00:01:00:20 – 00:01:03:14

Brian Fauver

It’s great to be with you. And, yeah, excited to talk shop.

00:01:03:16 – 00:01:25:23

Zack Oates

So first of all, tell me, as an investor, not a normal investor, he’s a cool investor, everyone. So he’s just looking to make that point as an investor. Like why restaurants? It’s one of the things that so many other investors look at and they’re like, this is too hard for us. What made you look at it and say, yeah, let’s go.

00:01:26:00 – 00:01:48:01

Brian Fauver

Yeah, it is true, right? It is an industry that oftentimes is tasked with that way, that it isn’t the best place for investment. I got introduced to investing in the space of, gosh, it’s coming up on almost 20 years ago. But I was with a group and we invested in a concept called Bojangles. It was 400 units at the time, and man, it was hook, line and sinker for me.

00:01:48:01 – 00:02:06:03

Brian Fauver

I was that annoying person who was just all over the CFO asking dumb questions. I’m high on the test kitchen all the time, and I got to see firsthand how the experience that you have in the stores and you know, the loyalty that was created by that brand, along with many others, is done.

00:02:06:03 – 00:02:13:05

Zack Oates

And, well, I mean, when you have a chicken biscuit like that, it’s pretty tough to not have a loyal following.

00:02:13:07 – 00:02:32:02

Brian Fauver

Yeah, I’m obsessive about biscuits. It’s been a nickname that people have called me over the course of my life. So. Yeah, I’m. I’m right there with you. But. Yeah, but that’s the brand, you know, again, like many who, figure out a way to make people extremely passionate about what it does and seeing that and be a part of that and getting a taste of that figuratively, literally.

00:02:32:02 – 00:02:38:03

Brian Fauver

I couldn’t get enough. And so my career since has just been trying to find that again and again and again.

00:02:38:05 – 00:02:43:22

Zack Oates

And when you’re looking to invest in a restaurant, what are the biggest metrics that you’re looking for?

00:02:43:24 – 00:03:07:15

Brian Fauver

Everybody’s looking at some of the same stuff. We all know it and talk about it. The unit economics, right. So it’s kind of starts and ends there in terms of what the first look is. But that only says so much. And honestly that’s not the end all be all for us. We’re looking for brands. And our goal as a group of mission is just to be the best possible partner for emerging brands out there.

00:03:07:17 – 00:03:28:24

Brian Fauver

And, in order to do that, we do try to find brands that have potential. For us, it comes down to a couple things. One, we love, you know, approachable concepts. We we love concepts that appeal to many, not the few. I grew up in North Carolina, redneck down here in the South. And I don’t need to be a New Yorker or Chicago to experience great food.

00:03:28:24 – 00:03:51:22

Brian Fauver

We have it here, and that’s because I’m accustomed to approachable concepts. We love differentiation. And, you know, it’s that can be done with convenience and experience. But brands have it a why for why they exist. Admittedly subjective, but something you can see firsthand. The last piece that’s big for us is on authenticity. Super hard where to define the kind of know it when you see it.

00:03:51:24 – 00:04:11:19

Brian Fauver

But brands that have a true foundational background for why they exist, that connects with people in an emotional way, you know, you’ve seen it, you’ve been a part of it. It’s happened to you. It’s out there, and when you see it, you know it. And then when we find and get to know founders and brands that have built that, I wish I could figure that out.

00:04:11:19 – 00:04:19:05

Brian Fauver

Like, I wish I could do that. I can’t, but I can see it. And when you do, it’s really exciting and we love to partner and be a part of that process.

00:04:19:06 – 00:04:42:13

Zack Oates

I think that that authenticity is something that people are looking for up and down the spectrum, and I think the authenticity means that it just feels so real and people don’t want the fakeness anymore, and they don’t want everything to be this just cookie cutter, this cookie cutter thing where I’m just a number and you don’t care about me.

00:04:42:15 – 00:05:00:02

Zack Oates

I wanted to feel personal. I want to feel like I’ve got a relationship. I want to feel like I know you. And that’s a huge demand of consumers nowadays. And if you’re yourself like we were actually talking before, we hit record about how we dress at trade shows and about how I felt like I needed to dress a certain way.

00:05:00:02 – 00:05:23:24

Zack Oates

And so if you look back at my the first trade shows I went to, I’m there wearing like a white shirt, slacks, dress shoes, and it’s just like it wasn’t me. And then just being able that we were talking about you and I just we decided to start dressing the way that we normally dress. And it’s so much easier to be you, as the old saying goes, in a world full of someone’s like, there’s only you, so just be you.

00:05:23:24 – 00:05:49:13

Zack Oates

And I think that’s really key. And I think that leads me to feel like the brands that when I look at them and I feel like I get that brand, it’s usually because there’s someone there who is just the heart and soul of that brand. And look at Nicole, the founder of swig. She is the heart and soul of that brand, and you could feel it when you go to a swig or auto with show.

00:05:49:16 – 00:06:00:01

Zack Oates

You go down to a pink show in Florida, in Texas, and it’s like you feel that there’s something different there. And that’s like the secret ingredient of brands that are making it versus brands that aren’t.

00:06:00:03 – 00:06:27:21

Brian Fauver

Without a doubt. You mentioned Morgan. So Morgan, they originated in Japan. It was started by a turtle. They’re the largest foodservice operator in Japan. And they have this amazing brand. There’s 1100 of them worldwide. And when we partnered with them, they were four units in the US. And before we partnered with them, we went to Japan. Right. We saw we went to the Kagawa Prefecture, where udon originated way longer than the life of our country.

00:06:27:23 – 00:06:45:12

Brian Fauver

This is something for a long time. And you see the building blocks like where it comes from. And then you come back to the US and you walk in the store and you see that a lot of the same processes are followed. Similarly, a lot of the team, many of which had spent time in Japan learning the craft, are there.

00:06:45:14 – 00:07:04:15

Brian Fauver

You can’t fake it, right? You can’t just make that up. You and I probably couldn’t come up with that, right? It just exists. And so that’s a superficial thing. And it’s tough because, you know, it is hard to create from scratch. That’s why I have so much respect for founders that can do it and that build teams that that are authentically associated with the brand connections they make with.

00:07:04:15 – 00:07:07:04

Brian Fauver

Yes, but man is powerful when you see it first hand.

00:07:07:04 – 00:07:20:20

Zack Oates

Well, and authenticity, I think we’re talking here about that strategy of authenticity and how that’s a very critical part of the guest experience. Anything else that you would say is an important aspect or strategy that people should be thinking about with guest experience?

00:07:20:22 – 00:07:48:21

Brian Fauver

I’m not the first person to say it right. This is, I think, pretty well known out there, but there is such a huge difference between service and hospitality and so we often talk about service and step service and everything, but the distinction between the two and the way that that hospitality makes you feel inside the four walls and even through off premise, that’s where a lot of our focus and attention is today and has been maybe more recently than in years past.

00:07:48:23 – 00:08:09:12

Brian Fauver

And so a lot of our conversations are being real, purposeful about that side. And so something as simple as surprise and delight, right? We all know it. We all talk about how that’s a great way to go above and beyond what people’s expectations are. And you feel great when you get something dropped on your table that you didn’t expect, right?

00:08:09:14 – 00:08:31:09

Brian Fauver

Well, a lot of brands, and we’re guilty of it too. We sort of talk and pay lip service to the concept, like, let’s do it. But it does take an extra step to put it into the format that you execute within your four walls. So we have a breakfast and lunch concept that’s amazing. It’s out in Indianapolis called Cafe Pod Issue.

00:08:31:11 – 00:08:48:12

Brian Fauver

One of their signature items is Cinnamon Toast, believe it or not. And you know, that might sound simple to you, but it is amazing. And so when you go to Cafe Pot issue, it’s not uncommon for you just to get some dropped on your table. And that’s not just because someone thought of it or that day they were feeling friendly.

00:08:48:12 – 00:09:12:04

Brian Fauver

It’s really part of what the team and culture is built around. It’s purposeful. And so I think that may be part of the distinction, and we certainly are in more conversations about things like that now, because it is a sentiment driver. It does get talked about when people talk about your brand, they do speak to things like that, which isn’t a make sure the ticket time is within seven minutes.

00:09:12:06 – 00:09:21:03

Brian Fauver

It’s different. It’s a different approach. And so we’re certainly had a lot more conversations with our teams and our brands about things like that. And we were probably 2 or 3 years.

00:09:21:03 – 00:09:41:01

Zack Oates

Yeah. And I think that’s so important that those the little things matter because they are the little things. And that sounds kind of like obvious. But at the end of the day, it’s hard to fake those little things. It’s hard to dropping off that cinnamon toast, that cinnamon French toast. It’s like a cinnamon toast. It’s like, that’s hard to do.

00:09:41:02 – 00:10:04:01

Zack Oates

That’s hard to like. Keep that a consistent thing unless it’s ingrained in who you are in your DNA. I think that’s so important. And I think about, you know, brands that I consistently feel welcome, that they give their team latitude and expect them to do those little things, and they share it and they celebrate it. And I think that’s so critical.

00:10:04:07 – 00:10:18:18

Zack Oates

Besides that, are there any other you like answering my questions before I ask that me or Brian? But like, I think that’s great because what a great tactic to think about. But is there any other tactics that you would say are important about improving the guest experience?

00:10:18:20 – 00:10:40:04

Brian Fauver

Yeah, I think where our brands really shine and maybe this isn’t just lately, maybe this is just in general, but it’s almost like a volume game of like maybe a volume of interactions or intensity of interactions. We have a brand on the West Coast called bakery. It’s a mediterranean tapas, restaurants. Amazing. The founders, they’re just obsessive about the guests experiences.

00:10:40:06 – 00:11:02:17

Brian Fauver

It’s almost clinical with them, but they’re so good at it and they never fall short of what they really spend a lot of time, effort, energy on is genuine interaction with guests, not just inside the store. So there are avid OpenTable users, right? So they use the platform not just for reservations. They communicate with guests directly and it’s not just in service recovery.

00:11:02:19 – 00:11:27:04

Brian Fauver

So they’ll reach out. If you’ve come a couple of times they’ve gone through and said, oh, who are the folks you know, what are the top 20 folks that visit our stores? And they’ll send them gifts. So they use the concept of like, hey, we’re going to create a relationship with you inside our four walls, but what else can we do outside of your visit to make sure that you are hearing from us and connecting with us directly?

00:11:27:06 – 00:11:56:05

Brian Fauver

It really creates that kind of bond. And they’re true. People don’t treat the restaurants as just places to go eat. And that in that way, I think in figuring out ways to increase your connection, like you mentioned, chop shop to Jason’s, a big fan of ovation. And, you know, he talks about how they used to just get Google reviews, or he had 18 or 20,000 Google reviews, and he switches over to ovation, and all of a sudden he’s got 60, 70,000 touchpoints with guests.

00:11:56:07 – 00:12:15:24

Brian Fauver

We all know that the restaurant industry is numbers everywhere, data everywhere. We’re data rich here, and that’s nice. But you do have to focus on what does lead to the right decision making. And I think increasing the intensity or the frequency of where you connect with your guests at times looking beyond your four walls can help you do it.

00:12:16:01 – 00:12:38:01

Zack Oates

I think that’s so right, because you’re only as good as your last experience. And if your last experience, if there was a mistake, that’s okay as long as you have that safety net. And so that’s why we always talk about how there’s value in the volume. Because the more people you talk to, the bigger your safety net is to protect your brand.

00:12:38:01 – 00:13:03:18

Zack Oates

And that is the most important thing that you have nowadays. Yes, it’s critical that you have good food and that you serve it up right. But we all know that there’s going to be mistakes, so you can’t operate off of the assumption of perfection. You operate off of the assumption of mistakes. And how are you going to make sure that you are there at that moment to provide an amazing experience?

00:13:03:20 – 00:13:24:16

Zack Oates

A local shop here, aubergine, they are phenomenal brand. I went in there this week and guess what? I ordered my bowl with no onions and there were onions on my bowl. I didn’t even have to get up. Someone walked by. The woman who took my order came up, said, I’m so sorry, there weren’t supposed to be onions on it.

00:13:24:18 – 00:13:48:20

Zack Oates

Took the ball back and they fixed it. I didn’t even have to tell them about it. And what does that do for me that increases my trust in that brand. So I’m so much more likely to go back now because I know that they care. And knowing that they care means that I know that my money is going to be well spent in the experience, that I’m going to get what I pay for.

00:13:48:20 – 00:13:55:17

Zack Oates

And I think that’s something that is just so critical nowadays, because the switching costs have never been lower.

00:13:55:19 – 00:14:22:19

Brian Fauver

Yeah, it’s competitive out there. That experience is driven culture. Yeah. Sabrina probably knows knows. We talk about know thyself, know thyself. Right. Like we we talk about understanding why people interact with your brand and why they’re connected to it, why they’re making those emotional connections with your brand. And, I mean, it’s hard. It’s not uncommon for us to sit around in a room and have opinions, subjective opinions about why people come and associate with our brands.

00:14:22:21 – 00:14:52:00

Brian Fauver

But when you get in a small room of people, you have a tendency just to maybe have the wrong perception of what it is. When you go actually talk and spend times or speak to people directly, hear from directly primary research re reviews, you know, really get into what is out there and what the perception actually is. It can be it’s humbling, but it can be surprising that the experience is like you had a really what’s driving it, not what I know potentially you in a boardroom or somewhere else were saying is behind the brand.

00:14:52:00 – 00:15:09:03

Brian Fauver

And so uncovering that is hard to do and takes work. But, we’ve seen it really be empowering and get everyone around the table, leadership team, store teams able to clearly articulate the why behind the brand. And then that’s when that happens. You know, let’s go.

00:15:09:06 – 00:15:22:02

Zack Oates

Yeah. Amen. And I think there’s so many key things that we’ve talked about here and so many great tactics and love the strategies here. Now, who is someone that we should be following? Who’s someone that deserves an ovation?

00:15:22:04 – 00:15:24:13

Brian Fauver

Oh man, can I do more than yes.

00:15:24:13 – 00:15:27:10

Zack Oates

Because you just there’s too many people. Yes.

00:15:27:12 – 00:15:45:15

Brian Fauver

Yeah, yeah. Well, well. So I gotta throw it to a few of our leadership team. So this is a really fun time for us right now because we have three brands, all who are in the span of this like 60, 70 days. We’re in right now are are opening their first new store in their first new market. So not their home market.

00:15:45:15 – 00:16:04:11

Brian Fauver

These are frontier markets. So, Danny and Bobby currently in New York, allow founders of bakery, as I mentioned earlier. And they’re getting ready to open in San Diego. So first store in a new market two weeks ago, cafe Potter Shoe Home and the cinnamon toast and the Shelly Anderson and her team just opened a new store in Lexington, First New Market.

00:16:04:11 – 00:16:27:06

Brian Fauver

And then literally tomorrow I’ll be at K 38, another brand of ours. It’s a Baja Mexican brand that’s opening their first store in New Market. And Brian Brennan’s. I think we all know this is one of the hardest things that a brand does go into the new market, you know, you don’t know. Yeah. You’re new. You’re kind of coming out party and you have to get people’s attention and start lead with that right foot.

00:16:27:06 – 00:16:38:19

Brian Fauver

And that group of folks that I just mentioned, they’re doing an amazing job of leading their teams and their brands and leading into these new markets. So gotta throw it to them. Exciting time. For all those.

00:16:38:20 – 00:16:44:17

Zack Oates

That’s awesome. Where you go. So, Brian, how do we find and follow you and your brands?

00:16:44:19 – 00:16:59:16

Brian Fauver

Yeah. Yeah. Of course. So so target Hunter. We’re on LinkedIn. So LinkedIn and then WWE with that target hunter.com obviously. And then and then yeah. So check us out there. Let’s see what we’re up to. And but I’m also on LinkedIn as well. So reach out and love to connect.

00:16:59:16 – 00:17:09:04

Zack Oates

Awesome. Well Brian for reminding us that authenticity bleeds into everything we do from food to fashion. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you so much for joining us. I’m give ovation.

00:17:09:06 – 00:17:11:08

Brian Fauver

Awesome Zach. Appreciate it buddy.

00:17:11:10 – 00:17:33:23

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation up.com.

Geoff Henry of Gong cha joins Zack Oates to discuss what it takes to scale a beverage brand across dozens of countries while maintaining consistency at the guest level. Geoff shares how Gong cha balances global systems with local execution, why operational discipline matters more than trends, and how guest feedback helps protect trust as the brand continues to grow worldwide.

Building a Brand That Travels Well (2:41)

“When you grow globally, consistency becomes the brand.”

Geoff explains that Gong cha’s success across markets comes down to repeatability. Guests expect the same experience whether they visit a store in Asia, the U.S., or Europe. That expectation forces the brand to build strong systems that travel well and support teams at every level.

Why Systems Matter More Than Scale (6:18)

“Growth only works if the fundamentals are locked in.”

As Gong cha expanded, Geoff emphasizes that scale alone does not create success. Without disciplined processes, growth can quickly erode the guest experience. He shares how clear standards and operational guardrails help franchise partners execute confidently while protecting the brand.

Balancing Local Flexibility With Global Standards (9:44)

“You have to respect local markets without breaking the brand.”

Geoff discusses the challenge of adapting to regional preferences while maintaining a global identity. Gong cha allows thoughtful localization, but only within a framework that preserves quality, service expectations, and brand trust across every location.

The Role of Feedback in Protecting Guest Trust (13:02)

“Feedback tells you where the cracks are before they become problems.”

Guest feedback plays a critical role in Gong cha’s operations. Geoff explains how listening at scale helps the brand identify small issues early, correct inconsistencies, and maintain a strong guest relationship even as the business grows rapidly.

Execution Is the Real Competitive Advantage (16:27)

“Most brands know what to do. Fewer actually do it well.”

Geoff highlights that long term success comes down to execution. Gong cha focuses on training, accountability, and clarity so teams can deliver reliably every day. In a crowded beverage category, strong execution becomes the differentiator guests notice and remember.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/geoff-henry/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/gongchagloballtd/about/

https://www.gong-cha.com/

https://www.instagram.com/gongchatea/

Transcript

00:00:00:06 – 00:00:26:23

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give An Ovation, the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I get to chat with an industry expert to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by Ovation the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what is actually happening in your restaurant and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:27:00 – 00:00:50:01

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today we have a legend of the industry, Geoff Henry, with us today. He has spent almost a decade with the Coca-Cola company. He was president of Jamba Juice. He’s the president of the Americas for Gongcha, which is just like a phenomenal drink brand doing such cool stuff. If you’ve never been to a Gongcha go, it’s really cool.

00:00:50:01 – 00:00:56:24

Zack Oates

A lot of fun. Well, Geoff, thanks for taking some time away from your drinking career to have some sips with us here. How are you?

00:00:57:01 – 00:00:59:17

Geoff Henry

I’m doing great. Thanks so much, Zach. Great to be here.

00:00:59:19 – 00:01:05:23

Zack Oates

Now, I gotta say, you went to HBS. Was that before or after Coca-Cola?

00:01:06:00 – 00:01:13:15

Geoff Henry

Before? Yeah, I basically did a few years in finance, then went back to HBS and then pivoted into brand marketing and strategy.

00:01:13:17 – 00:01:23:05

Zack Oates

And it sounds like specifically you have done quite a bit in the beverage industry. Like, what’s drawn you to drink the Coke? Jamba Gongcha?

00:01:23:07 – 00:01:39:02

Geoff Henry

If you ask me that question 30 years ago, I’m not sure I would have ever scripted out kind of how it’s all played out, but beverages are a lot of fun. Before I joined Coke, I worked for Colgate doing kind of toothpaste and personal care. Great company, but not nearly as much fun once I got into the beverage world.

00:01:39:04 – 00:01:58:17

Geoff Henry

I joined Coke back in 2006 and I joined working on brand Coca Cola. Kind of their flagship. And so just that kind of just pulled me into the whole beverage world. Got to see just so much great activity on the marketing side. On the innovation side. And yeah, so I went from basically on the soft drinks side of Coke.

00:01:58:17 – 00:02:11:10

Geoff Henry

After a few years, I moved over to more of that, the still beverages. So for about eight years I was running their water, tea and coffee businesses. And then that just kind of led into eventually Jamba Juice and then here at Gongcha, which I can talk more on that too.

00:02:11:11 – 00:02:26:21

Zack Oates

So when you were there with Coke, just out of curiosity, did you get to work on other beverages in the Coke family, like Diet Coke or Coke Zero? Or were you only focused on full sugar, full throttle Coca-Cola?

00:02:26:23 – 00:02:48:19

Geoff Henry

I was on Coca Cola, in fact, back in when I first started. We still called it Coca Cola Classic because again, back in the 80s when Coke had the whole Coke new Coke. Oh yeah. This is example. Well, after all, that basically went down and Coke reintroduced Coke. That’s when they added the word classic to Coca Cola Classic, and it stuck on it.

00:02:48:21 – 00:02:59:12

Geoff Henry

Stayed on there for 20 years. Basically I was the brand manager there. What we decided all right, it’s been long enough. Let’s take the classic off of all the packaging and just call it Coke again.

00:02:59:14 – 00:03:19:22

Zack Oates

Oh, wow. That’s interesting. Anyway, well, as an avid soda drinker, I feel like it’s part of the questions. If you want to get your driver’s license here in Utah, it’s like you have to drink a minimum of 44oz of soda a day. Anyway, just grateful for all your hard work because I’m a much happier man. In the afternoon after my lunch.

00:03:19:22 – 00:03:29:18

Zack Oates

Coke. So love it. What drew you to Gongcha? What was it that got you interested there? And maybe for people who aren’t familiar, if you want to explain a little bit about Gongcha.

00:03:29:20 – 00:03:54:23

Geoff Henry

Yeah. So Gongcha has been around for 20 years. We are the world’s largest bubble tea brand. We started in Taiwan back in 2006, and we are a high quality premium bubble tea. And Gongcha literally means tea served up to royalty. It’s ceremonial tea grade and we pride ourselves on the quality and consistency of the tea that we deliver around the world.

00:03:55:00 – 00:04:17:00

Geoff Henry

We’re now in 30 countries, were in 2200 locations in the US. We have just shy of 250 locations. We’re kind of in 22 different states, and then we have a good presence up in Canada, 100 stores, Mexico 100 stores. So we’re just rapidly growing the brand around the world and certainly here in the Americas. And it’s just a lot of fun.

00:04:17:01 – 00:04:33:20

Geoff Henry

I mean, the bubble tea category has been on fire in the US now for ten plus years, and I first started to see it when I was at Coke because I was running the tea and coffee brands for the North American Coke business, and I started to see bubble tea, I was skeptical, I didn’t know if I was going to stick around.

00:04:34:01 – 00:04:53:23

Geoff Henry

I thought maybe be more of a fad. I left Coke to run Jamba Juice for five years, and I just continued to see bubble tea proliferate, shops opening up all over the country as the whole category moved from like heavily Asian communities into college and university towns. And then basically now every major metro in the US has a number of bubble tea shops.

00:04:54:00 – 00:04:58:10

Zack Oates

What do you think it is about bubble tea that gets people so interested?

00:04:58:12 – 00:05:17:08

Geoff Henry

I mean, if you been to a bubble tea shop and you’ve had a bubble tea or some of the other beverages we offer, I mean, first off, they’re just great to look at, right? Like visually they’re testing. So in this world of Instagram and our core guests tend to be like 18 to 30 years old with their phone and Instagram basically always on.

00:05:17:10 – 00:05:42:17

Geoff Henry

We’re a perfect complement to that lifestyle. We’re very much it’s a lifestyle category. And so I’d say for this Gen Z age group, like they see bubble tea as like the drink of their generation. The drink of maybe my generation was the latte from back in the 1990s. This is very much the drink of the younger generation, and you can personalize it however you want the tea type, the toppings, the sugar level.

00:05:42:17 – 00:05:58:15

Geoff Henry

We’ve also got fruit drinks. We’ve got smoothies so you can make the drink however you want it based on your mood in that day or at that moment. So I think that personalization customization just lends itself to the rapid adoption of the category and our brand in particular.

00:05:58:17 – 00:06:14:16

Zack Oates

Yeah, and I actually used to live right by a Gong chai in San Francisco, and it was a great place to just go and meet up for a business meeting when, you know that after a business meeting where I’m not quite I’m not looking for, like a soda, I’m not looking to sit down and like, have a coffee with someone.

00:06:14:19 – 00:06:35:13

Zack Oates

It’s a great alternative there. And also, I feel like this generation is so much about textures, and textures is such a critical thing. Like, you look at all the candies that are coming out, which again, utilize it in here, all the candies that are coming out, there’s so much about interesting texture as opposed to just adding different flavors.

00:06:35:13 – 00:06:57:15

Zack Oates

It used to be let’s throw this flavor in, in that flavor it and now it’s like, hey, let’s throw this crunch in and this creamy in and this new getting like in layering this. And so I feel like that’s another thing that bubble tea has up against some of the competitors is just that fun surprise with the other tapioca pearls or any of the other kind of bursting pearls.

00:06:57:17 – 00:07:21:19

Geoff Henry

I mean, the texture is definitely a big part of it. I think part of why bubble tea has done so well, particularly with the at the younger generation. And, you know, college towns is because people often consume it while they’re studying, right? Like there’s actually like zero benefits that show that they’re drinking the bubble tea, which gives them a little bit of caffeine from the tea, maybe a little bit of sugar boost and kind of carbohydrate energy.

00:07:21:21 – 00:07:41:13

Geoff Henry

But it’s also like the actual chewing of the tapioca pearls. It’s actually soothing, like so they’re studying, they’re getting the caffeine uplift, but they’re also kind of bringing their blood pressure down a little bit just through the actual chewing. So to your point, like they’d hope the textures and all the different layers, I think just add to the whole experience and it kind of have made it.

00:07:41:13 – 00:07:43:08

Geoff Henry

Why it’s, it’s been so successful.

00:07:43:11 – 00:07:50:01

Zack Oates

So what do you think is one of the most important aspects of guest experience nowadays?

00:07:50:03 – 00:08:09:03

Geoff Henry

Yeah. Great question. I think it’s changed a lot, largely dependent on like the store type and what the guest is wanting. In the case of bubble tea, we obviously wanted the guest to have a great experience, but in many cases the guest is just coming in getting the beverage and leaving, or in many cases, they’re ordering in advance.

00:08:09:03 – 00:08:29:03

Geoff Henry

I mean, we often have 40 or 50% of our orders coming through the mobile app or third party delivery. So it’s almost like we don’t actually see the guest. And then even as they come into the store, we actually have cell order kiosks, and 90% of our transactions in the store go through the support kiosk because our guests would rather see the full menu.

00:08:29:03 – 00:08:46:02

Geoff Henry

They want to take the time to peruse like, hey, I want this tea with this topping, this layer of milk foam. So that’s all part of the experience. And the kiosk, I think, helps deliver that more comprehensively than even the probably a team member can do behind the counter. Now, if you’re a first time guest, we want you to go up to the counter.

00:08:46:07 – 00:09:06:04

Geoff Henry

But the team member kind of take you through the menu, help you kind of understand maybe what you want to start. Try first. But if you’re a regular guests, like helping actually guide them to a kiosk and letting get more familiar with other categories that we offer tends to work out well for the guests, and that tends to work out well for the operator, because the guest gets the ultimately the drink that they want to try.

00:09:06:06 – 00:09:12:01

Geoff Henry

And we tend to see actually a higher average ticket through the kiosk too, just because of the suggestive sell mechanism at the end.

00:09:12:03 – 00:09:39:24

Zack Oates

Sometimes I go into this a drink place. I don’t want to throw them under the bus, but I went to this drink place and I hate ordering from the kiosk because I like my drink a specific way and it doesn’t allow for customizations on the kiosk. And so that’s one of the things where I literally have not ordered from there and have gone to someplace else because I’m like, they always seem annoyed when I order from the register and the kiosk doesn’t let me do my customizations, you know that.

00:09:40:03 – 00:10:02:22

Geoff Henry

Yeah. And for us, like customizations at the core of what we offer our kiosks have to be pretty robust. Like, we don’t want to send somebody to the kiosk and then have them have a subpar experience. So for us, again, you might spend a minute and a half at the kiosk is making your drink. We tend to have two, if not three kiosks in our locations just because of how important it is for us and for the guests.

00:10:02:24 – 00:10:22:15

Geoff Henry

So I think it just based on your question, part of it depends on like what type of transaction is it? Right? Like if somebody basically just wants the great product and they want it with speed and convenience, then we got to make sure that that kiosk experience is great. To your point. Like we’re actually delivering all the customization that they need so that they can kind of do the transaction quickly.

00:10:22:17 – 00:10:39:09

Geoff Henry

If it’s somebody who’s a first time guests, we want them to feel like we’re holding their hand. The team member behind the counter can kind of show them the few categories we offer, maybe the top ten drinks that people tend to order and kind of just take off some of the intimidation factor of entering a bubble tea shop for the first time.

00:10:39:09 – 00:10:54:18

Zack Oates

Yeah, I love that. Yeah, because it can be a bit intimidating when you go in there, especially when you guys really have that authentic vibe to it. It doesn’t say like, this is like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a drink like you keep it very authentic. And it’s like some of the stuff I was like, what is that?

00:10:54:18 – 00:11:10:06

Zack Oates

But it’s fun to have that exploration because of it, but the familiarity. So when you’re thinking about some tactics that you’ve used to improve the guest experience throughout your career, other CPGs or in FNB, what do you think.

00:11:10:08 – 00:11:38:01

Geoff Henry

Data is a great thing to have? We’ve done some customer surveys, either through our loyalty platform. We do a kind of a quick survey at the end of our transactions, and so kind of getting an average pulse on, you know, how people are feeling is obviously critically important, obviously an area of you and your firm’s expertise. So for us having that, you know, a firm grasp on how are the guests feeling about both the product quality, the service, the cleanliness of the store?

00:11:38:07 – 00:11:56:02

Geoff Henry

Would they come back? Would they recommend us like those are kind of four key areas that we often look at and try and track over time. So and I think that’s our baseline is like making sure we get the data. And sometimes it’s hard to get enough of that data to make it worthwhile. Right. Like if you’re only getting a few surveys per month, it’s probably not statistically significant.

00:11:56:04 – 00:11:58:21

Geoff Henry

So, you know, we still kind of work through that as well.

00:11:58:23 – 00:12:16:24

Zack Oates

Yeah, I think that it’s so critical that as you’re looking at, there’s a phrase that we always say here at ovation, which is the values in the volume. And there’s wisdom to that, because as you’re able to get more people to give you feedback, if it’s negative, then guess what? You can recover them. And if it’s positive, then guess what?

00:12:17:03 – 00:12:44:23

Zack Oates

You could market to them. The more people that you get to take your survey, they’ll get to give you feedback. Not only the better can you do as a brand, but the more people you get to connect with. And I think that’s something that we’ve seen, and especially with drinks, we see other drink companies that were with where the highest percentile of people will come into a restaurant more days than they are open in a given month.

00:12:45:00 – 00:13:03:19

Zack Oates

So it’s like there are people that will come into these drink places twice a day, sometimes on like twice a day on Saturdays and once a day throughout the week. It’s nuts to see, but when you’re able to get that kind of data and able to understand who the guest is, it helps push you in such a smarter direction.

00:13:03:21 – 00:13:12:17

Zack Oates

Speaking of smart direction, there’s a lot of smart people that you know. I mean, you’ve had an incredible career, but who is someone that you think deserves innovation? Who’s someone that we should be following?

00:13:12:19 – 00:13:28:00

Geoff Henry

Yeah. Great question. There’s a lot of folks that I have a lot of respect for, a brand that I wasn’t all that familiar with up until a couple of years ago. It’s because they just didn’t have that much of a presence here. I live in Atlanta, so they didn’t have much of a presence in the southeast. Is Culver’s and the whole Culver’s family.

00:13:28:02 – 00:13:56:16

Geoff Henry

I have been very impressed with just the quality and the consistency of how that brand shows up, and the level of service and real appreciation that the team members in. That’s and those stores are showing to the guests. If you’d asked me that question three years ago, colors wouldn’t have been on my shortlist. I think based upon what I’ve experienced the past couple of years, and as I’ve learned more about the brand and had more interactions there, definitely on my short list of brands that are doing it right now.

00:13:56:16 – 00:14:24:03

Geoff Henry

Again, they’re very different in terms of their footprint compared to my experience in the beverage space where I’ve got, you know, typically small stores, they’ve obviously got a much bigger menu. They got drive thrus and almost all their locations. So they have to deal with different things as well. But and my experience is primarily been going into the store and ordering at the counter, but then ordering at the counter and then sitting down and then having somebody stop by a few minutes after I start in a fast casual like that, like people ask me how the meal is going.

00:14:24:03 – 00:14:27:11

Geoff Henry

I was like, I’ve been blown away. So I think they’re doing a really good job.

00:14:27:13 – 00:14:44:20

Zack Oates

Well, speaking of personalization and customizations, I have a good friend who worked at Culver’s for a long time all through high school, and you want to know a drink that a milkshake that he said he would probably get asked to make once a day. Okay, you ready for this?

00:14:44:22 – 00:14:45:19

Geoff Henry

I’m ready.

00:14:45:21 – 00:15:01:18

Zack Oates

A vanilla milkshake. And Culver’s is famous for their really thick custard. And they do some great milkshakes he would order, or he would get ordered and it would have to make vanilla milkshake with hamburger patties ground up into it.

00:15:01:20 – 00:15:03:24

Geoff Henry

That was a frequent request that they were getting asked.

00:15:03:24 – 00:15:20:16

Zack Oates

And I was like, oh, like once a year. Did you make this? Like he’s like, no, probably like once a day, once every other day someone would come in and order a milkshake with a hamburger patty ground up into it. I mean, it just seems so bizarre. But then you think about it and you’re like, well, I did my fries in my frosty.

00:15:20:16 – 00:15:27:20

Zack Oates

Like, maybe that’ll work. Anyway, I don’t want to yuck someone’s yum, but that seems a bit odd to do.

00:15:27:20 – 00:15:29:12

Geoff Henry

Where to get your protein delivery, right?

00:15:29:12 – 00:15:47:08

Zack Oates

Yeah, exactly. That’s cool, but I do. I love Culver’s as someone who didn’t grow up with Culver’s, I do have to say, when I moved to Utah and I saw the signs for Culver’s, for the first two years I lived here in Utah, I thought it was a furniture store. It’s not a traditional restaurant of like, you got the reds and the yellows.

00:15:47:08 – 00:15:48:02

Zack Oates

I mean, like, it’s.

00:15:48:02 – 00:15:48:14

Geoff Henry

Just toned.

00:15:48:14 – 00:16:02:19

Zack Oates

Down. Yeah, it’s very toned down. It’s very blue. You’ve got carpeted interiors. It’s a very different vibe, but they’ve got a great product, so good on them. I actually just had Culver’s this week drive and on my road trip to Vegas. It was great. So.

00:16:02:22 – 00:16:03:21

Geoff Henry

Oh, nice.

00:16:04:02 – 00:16:08:04

Zack Oates

Anyway, well, Geoff, how do people find and follow you and Gongcha?

00:16:08:06 – 00:16:21:20

Geoff Henry

Yeah. So it’s funny. Gang Gongcha Instagram. Yeah, gang Chatty is where you can check us out, and we’d certainly encourage you to do so. And me, I’m not worth following. You can find LinkedIn. Geoff Henry.

00:16:21:22 – 00:16:26:11

Zack Oates

A LinkedIn Geoff for the G team. We’re talking like Geoffrey Giraffe.

00:16:26:13 – 00:16:44:10

Geoff Henry

Exactly. Geophys. And Henry and Linda. So for you. But yeah, I think our Instagram handle, we’ve always got some fun stuff. And because we’re a global brand, you’ll often see stuff on there, not just from like, the Americas, but from around the world. You know, we’ve got 800 stores in Korea, a couple hundred in Japan, a few hundred in Australia.

00:16:44:10 – 00:17:02:14

Geoff Henry

So again, the fun thing about Gongcha and this brand is it truly is global in nature. And we’ve got even before we come into new markets here in the US, just because of the strength of the brand in Asia. Now when we come in, we already have lines and people asking what are we opening? There’s just a lot of excitement for the brand.

00:17:02:16 – 00:17:11:18

Zack Oates

Well deserved as well. Well, Geoff, for spending two decades hydrating Americas, today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and giving ovation.

00:17:11:20 – 00:17:13:23

Geoff Henry

Thanks so much, Zach. Great being with you.

00:17:14:00 – 00:17:36:12

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation up.com.

Andrew Pudalov is not the typical restaurant founder. Before launching Rush Bowls, he spends years in New York City as the global head of fixed income derivative trading, placing huge institutional bets for major banks. Today he leads a franchise built on real ingredients, customization, and a very human approach to guest experience.

From Trading Floors to Smoothie Bowls (01:13)

Andrew describes his first career as being a “professional gambler taking positions on behalf of the bank,” working with currencies, interest rates, and massive trades. Over time, the thrill fades and he starts craving something more meaningful and people focused. He shares that he wants to “do something totally different” and build a business from scratch that fits the kind of life he wants for his family.

Building a Bowl Company Before Bowls Were Cool (06:03)

Looking at what his kids and other families are eating, Andrew sees a gap for healthier options that are still satisfying. He moves to Boulder, leans into its health minded culture, and creates a bowl concept long before that category is everywhere. Guests get food that helps them “eat good and feel good and feel full,” with a menu centered on real fruit and vegetables instead of sorbets or premade sugary bases.

Guests Are Always Right, Even When They Are Not (09:51)

Andrew is very clear about his philosophy on service. “Listen, the consumer is always right,” he says. In a franchise system that can be tricky, but he reminds operators that arguing over a bowl is never worth it. “Our job is to make them happy,” even if that means remaking an order or comping something small to protect long term loyalty.

Training a New Generation of Team Members (11:20)

Rush Bowls relies heavily on college age employees, which means guest interaction cannot be left to chance. Andrew talks about the “Gen Z stare” that can feel distant, so the brand invests heavily in scripting, training, and coaching. The goal is to help team members be real, genuine, and conversational so guests feel like they are visiting a friendly neighborhood bar, just one that serves healthy food.

Data, Simplicity, and Constant Improvement (17:21)

Even with a warm, human brand, Andrew leans hard on numbers. About “80 percent of our sales are bowls,” so he focuses the menu there, trims the bottom performers, and tests new ingredients like mushrooms and different add ons. For him, staying real means both authentic hospitality and the discipline to keep moving the concept forward.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-pudalov-07697010/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/rush-bowls/

https://rushbowls.com/franchise/research-us/our-story

https://www.instagram.com/rushbowls/?hl=en

Transcript

00:00:00:07 – 00:00:25:22

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give An Ovation the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I chat with industry experts to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurants and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:25:24 – 00:00:43:12

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today we have what seems to be, on the surface, a very quintessential guest that we would have. He’s the founder and CEO of Rush Bulls and Rush Bulls franchisee. And he’s been doing some amazing stuff. Andrew Padilla what’s up Andrew.

00:00:43:14 – 00:00:47:01

Andrew Pudalov

Having a great day. Great to see you. Happy to be on your show.

00:00:47:05 – 00:01:08:01

Zack Oates

And the reason Andrew, I’ll give you a bit of a hard time is because while on the surface you seem just like the quintessential guest. You had a stint outside of the restaurant industry. Now we’re going back 21 years because you’ve been at Rush Bulls for a long time. But when I sat down with you for dinner, your journey into the food business was just like, so interesting.

00:01:08:03 – 00:01:13:04

Zack Oates

I would love for you to share. How did you get from where you’re at to where you are?

00:01:13:06 – 00:01:27:21

Andrew Pudalov

Sure, yeah, I have a couple of lives, basically. So earlier in my career and to midpoint of my career, I would say depending on how you define your career, I was global head of fixed income derivative trading in New York City.

00:01:27:21 – 00:01:29:24

Zack Oates

Which side were asleep? You were fixed.

00:01:30:03 – 00:01:33:24

Andrew Pudalov

I, I was a gambler for the bets.

00:01:34:02 – 00:01:35:05

Zack Oates

Okay.

00:01:35:07 – 00:02:03:24

Andrew Pudalov

I was a professional gambler taking positions on behalf of the bank. Now brokering, actually taking the positions for the banks in very interesting structured derivative structures, they call it. So placing bets for a lot of different banks and generating returns on them, and providing services for institutional customers that needed to handle their balance sheets in certain ways or handle income in certain ways.

00:02:04:01 – 00:02:19:11

Andrew Pudalov

So it was a specialty that would involve currency, interest rates, futures. So it was pretty involved and it involved very large shocks, large scale trades. Small trade I ever did was 20 million. So up to a billion.

00:02:19:15 – 00:02:43:02

Zack Oates

When you were like, hey fam, I got an idea, why don’t we leave all of this money stuff behind and sell food? I’m sure they were like, Andrew, do it. That’s amazing. What a good idea. How did that conversation go? Going from like, fine nuance, which is just, like, so stable to something. That is just, what a crazy asset to have a restaurant brand.

00:02:43:04 – 00:03:02:19

Andrew Pudalov

Well, a couple things. It’s not stable if you’re generating more revenue. And I was it’s stable, but very few people can do that for an extended period of time. So my shelf life at that type of position was nearing an end. But the trigger really was nine over 11. So I was working in New York City. My wife was working.

00:03:02:19 – 00:03:19:09

Andrew Pudalov

She was in a tower in 93, the first time they bombed it, and that was pretty harrowing for her. She was really high up, was my wife at the time, but 911 was her first day back from maternity. She was in the 20s. I was in Midtown. She actually saw the plane crash in and one of my good friends worked at Kenner.

00:03:19:09 – 00:03:41:16

Andrew Pudalov

He jumped. Oh, it was pretty catastrophic for us really emotionally. Living in New York City, too. There was anthrax warnings. You couldn’t take the subway. You had to duct tape your windows. It was pretty harrowing on all levels. I wanted to interact with people more. So when you were in that position that I was in, you’re taking big bets.

00:03:41:22 – 00:04:08:09

Andrew Pudalov

Your. Yes, mine, yours. There’s not a lot of interaction with customers and it’s very curt. And I really wanted to move out in New York, do something totally different that I had no knowledge about, and build it from scratch based on my abilities. And I wanted nothing. The industry that’s very different. I wanted to really challenge myself and really create a different environment for my kids to grow up in.

00:04:08:13 – 00:04:22:16

Andrew Pudalov

So unfortunately for me, I picked food, which is one of the toughest industries you can pick. I think certainly banking is a lot easier, I would say, but food is definitely more interactive, more interesting in many ways and more fun.

00:04:22:18 – 00:04:41:21

Zack Oates

What an incredible story and the journey to get in here and realizing that this is all about people. I mean, I often talk about when I do my keynotes, I talk about the famous quote that many people climb the ladder of life only to realize it’s leaning against the wrong wall. And what good does it do to climb this ladder?

00:04:41:21 – 00:04:59:24

Zack Oates

If you get to the top and you’re like, wait a second, everything that’s important is on that wall. And it often takes something pretty dramatic happening in our lives to push us to make that change. I mean, you look at people that are unhealthy and they go to the doctor and they’re like, hey, you’ve got two years to live.

00:05:00:01 – 00:05:18:04

Zack Oates

And they turn their life around and things like that. They take it, but it’s like, how do we have that mentality every day? On keeping what’s important important over the last 21 plus years, how have you kept that mentality of putting first things first?

00:05:18:06 – 00:05:46:21

Andrew Pudalov

What you said was really important in my life, right? So and it’s very telling. The highs were lower and the lows were lower. I was running a big trading group. I had a really super high position at the bank in banks. And it wasn’t about money really. They paid me well for what I did. That afforded me to change, but I wasn’t happy and a lot of fronts and 9/11 just brought that together.

00:05:46:21 – 00:06:03:10

Andrew Pudalov

So when you say the ladders lean against the wrong wall, well, early in my career, it’s the greatest life in the world. You’re treated like a rock star, but after a while it’s not as meaningful. And I wanted to do something that was meaningful. And I had little kids, and I saw what they were eating in New York City.

00:06:03:10 – 00:06:07:08

Andrew Pudalov

And it was a hot dog, grilled cheese pizza, chicken sandwich.

00:06:07:10 – 00:06:12:16

Zack Oates

That literally is what I’m ordering for lunch today. It’s on its way right now. So yeah.

00:06:12:18 – 00:06:27:07

Andrew Pudalov

I wanted to go into a college town. Boulder is known to be a little more health oriented and really change how people were eating. And that’s how I stepped into this role and created the bowl concept 21 years ago. No one was doing bowls.

00:06:27:09 – 00:06:48:00

Zack Oates

Yeah, and it’s amazing to see how this has boomed in this concept is just from this little seedling. Because at the end of the day, when you’re looking at health and you’re looking at what you’re doing and what you’re building like, people want to eat good and feel good and feel full and looking at your menu, that’s what you’re all about.

00:06:48:00 – 00:07:14:05

Zack Oates

And so when you think about this in the perspective of the guest experience, and it’s kind of interesting because you’ve lived in the restaurant industry long enough that you’re no longer a finance guy, but you’re a restaurant guy. And when you think about the guest experience, what do you think the most important aspects are, and are there any lessons that you’ve learned from finance that have carried over, or have you had to, like, start fresh when it comes to the guest experience?

00:07:14:07 – 00:07:41:07

Andrew Pudalov

Well, two things. Finance was incredibly important for me running my business. I think you can’t underestimate the importance of understanding cards, understanding running a business, how to make it profitable. I came into this with a very different approach, and I think it was very, very helpful for our success. In terms of customer experience, I’ve learned a lot, but I will tell you, it’s changed a lot too.

00:07:41:07 – 00:08:08:15

Andrew Pudalov

And people always want that interaction. They want to feel like that’s their friend when they come into the store, right? They want to have that personal connection. And at today’s day and age, that’s really hard because the consumer is still, I think, even striving for it more and more. But the employees are. So it’s a more of a challenge for employees because they’re so used to being on their phone or isolated.

00:08:08:17 – 00:08:39:04

Andrew Pudalov

And I see a very divided society in many ways because everyone’s insulated into their own worlds, whether it’s phones, social media or whatever else. And how do you convert that and make the employee interact more with the consumer and make the consumer happier? Because on a consumer side, they’re looking for that interaction. I see it every day. And the consumer, to me, they’re telling you everything they’re telling you, which is great for your software too, but they’re telling you, hey, I like this product.

00:08:39:04 – 00:08:54:08

Andrew Pudalov

I don’t like this product. You didn’t say hi to me. I’m not happy about it. Like, this is the greatest employee ever. And for us as a company, it’s for us to make that consumer as happy as possible.

00:08:54:10 – 00:09:17:22

Zack Oates

Yeah, I mean, I love that. And if you think about that from the perspective of everyone is striving to make the guest happy, what does that look like? What does that look like when someone comes in and hey, you made my bowl wrong. Do you argue with them because or do you just say, great, let’s do that again for you or someone messages in and it’s like, hey, you forgot my toppings.

00:09:18:01 – 00:09:43:02

Zack Oates

It’s like, how do you make that right? How do you make them happy? And I was actually just at a Dave’s Hot Chicken conference, and it was really interesting to see them. While not the most healthy food, they also are trying to be like a genuine, authentic company. But one of the big things is like they just say yes, because is it worth fighting against over a $5 thing, offer the principle of it, or just like, just make them happy, right?

00:09:43:02 – 00:09:51:01

Zack Oates

Because the power that a negative review has is just dangerous. I mean, it’s going to hurt your business. Genuinely.

00:09:51:03 – 00:10:15:17

Andrew Pudalov

Listen, the consumer is always right. It’s an old adage, but it has to be treated that way. And in a franchise system, too, it’s a little it has its own complications because you have a franchisee who may take it personally, may be like, well, I serve that person perfectly. I don’t know, it’s not worth it. And it’s really still a customer service business, right?

00:10:15:18 – 00:10:37:04

Andrew Pudalov

So they have to and we have to always have that mentality for a successful business that the customer’s right, even if they’re wrong, they’re right. Our job is to make them happy. And if they want to, they don’t like the bowl. Who cares? Honestly, for us it’s 2,530% cost of goods, labor, whatever it is. What are you giving up?

00:10:37:06 – 00:10:49:18

Andrew Pudalov

But if you give them an argument, you’re not changing their minds, right? It’s almost like a political argument with whoever you’re supporting. You’re not going to just convert them because of your beliefs or you feeling your right.

00:10:49:22 – 00:11:03:13

Zack Oates

Right. When’s the last time someone said, you are so dumb for voting for that person? And they were like, I never thought of it that way. You are right, I’m going to switch my political views like this is not how it happens.

00:11:03:15 – 00:11:13:11

Andrew Pudalov

Right? And I think same thing with food, right? And as people are more and more isolated in their environments, their opinions are not going to get softer. Let’s put that.

00:11:13:11 – 00:11:20:10

Zack Oates

Yeah, I think that’s a really good point. So what are some tactics that you’ve used to improve the guest experience?

00:11:20:12 – 00:11:47:22

Andrew Pudalov

Well, first of all, real and genuine I mean number one, be real. Be genuine interactive web and script people. Because I know that doesn’t sound real and genuine, but it at least initiates that conversation going right. I view our restaurants as healthy bars, basically serving healthy food without alcohol or anything negative. You know, we’re unique in this position because everything is customizable.

00:11:47:22 – 00:12:08:23

Andrew Pudalov

There’s no sorbets, no added sugars. You can make it whether you have a dietary need, an allergy, any which way. With that type of product, it’s really empowering to the consumer. The consumer has to also understand you want strawberries on top, you want blueberries, you want coconut. We’re here to please you have it your way. I think Burger King was really smart early on with that.

00:12:09:00 – 00:12:34:20

Andrew Pudalov

That’s our same philosophy. Most of our competitors in the space have a premade sugar, sugar, ice cream, basically base or sorbet that they put food on. That’s not us. So having the consumer really understand they’re empowered. We only do real fruit, real vegetables. We don’t have pre-made bases or added sugar. So it’s really empowering the consumer and getting feedback from the consumer about what they want.

00:12:34:23 – 00:13:03:18

Andrew Pudalov

So then you kind of force the interaction a little bit on that regard, but also training the employees. We’ve spent tons and tons of time training employees because it is difficult. A lot of employees. We hire are college age, and they’re looking at their phones all the time. The Gen Z stare, they call it. So there’s just a blank stare and it’s not meant, but it can be perceived as impersonal or rude and it’s not really meant that way.

00:13:03:18 – 00:13:24:13

Andrew Pudalov

So really redefining how we handle customer service, and we’re working on that every day. We put a lot, a lot. And same thing with digital making that as involved making the consumer feel connected, what they want, what they like really spending a lot of time in that arena to make sure the message gets across in every which way.

00:13:24:15 – 00:13:43:12

Zack Oates

Well, and when you look at your online ratings, you know, 4.5, 4.8 like it’s coming through, people are seeing it and they’re doing it because at the end of the day, this is why, as you know, from a finance perspective, when p groups tend to buy restaurants, you look at all these restaurants that have gone bankrupt. Almost every single one of them is owned by a P group.

00:13:43:14 – 00:14:05:01

Zack Oates

And the reason is because they try to extract everything out by canceling programs that the guests care about, by reducing the quality food to increase the margins. And they take a one year, two year bump. And then what happens? Guest satisfaction falls off. People stop coming in. And so when you do, I love that. Behind you says rush, is real.

00:14:05:07 – 00:14:27:18

Zack Oates

When you’re using those real things and you’re trying to be authentic and you’re giving the guidelines, the, you know, putting the bumpers in the alley. But the, I don’t bowl very much, obviously. But one of those things is that we got our gutters on a barbecue, but like, those are things that are really going to make a difference for you in the long run.

00:14:27:18 – 00:14:51:21

Zack Oates

And hey, look, if you’re looking to build a long term asset, which obviously you’ve done 20 plus years, it’s because you do it with authenticity and with real quality. So kudos to you, Andrew. It’s amazing to see what you build. I’ve followed you for a long time, and it’s amazing to see just how consistently you beat that drum of real and you don’t compromise there, which says a lot about who you are.

00:14:51:21 – 00:15:05:06

Zack Oates

So kudos to you, man. Now, being in this industry for so long, you know a lot of people who is someone that deserves an ovation, who’s someone that we should be following beside you? Oh come on.

00:15:05:08 – 00:15:37:04

Andrew Pudalov

I don’t know the person at all, but I will tell you, Kevin Hochman from Chili’s, what he’s doing for a brand that was not known but was known, but not in a positive way, is really remarkable. I think what he’s doing is something to really he’s ahead of the curve. He’s basically taking business, I think, from QSR, because people are now sitting down in restaurants, so it’s going against the trend and has done.

00:15:37:07 – 00:15:59:05

Andrew Pudalov

He he’s the CEO of, Chili’s, Brinker International. I think he’s doing an incredible job. I’ve never met him. I have no affiliation with him whatsoever. But when I look at companies that have rethought the business model and how to be successful, he’s number one for me right now.

00:15:59:07 – 00:16:14:13

Zack Oates

I mean, I will tell you, it was years. I mean, probably a decade since I had gone to Chili’s and I was there with one of my buddies and I’m like, hey, where should we go to lunch? I kind of like, jokingly was like, oh, you want to go to Chili’s? And he was like, dude, it’s actually good.

00:16:14:13 – 00:16:35:24

Zack Oates

I was like, come on. He’s like, no, let’s go. We went there and I got the big Kewpie burger. I walked out of there spending as much money as I would have at McDonald’s, and I was like, I had leftovers and it was good. So love that. Shout out some of that we should definitely be following because yeah, talk about someone who’s got something peeking around corners.

00:16:35:24 – 00:16:40:18

Zack Oates

If you are a fast follow of him, you’ll probably be on pace with what’s going on.

00:16:40:21 – 00:17:07:12

Andrew Pudalov

So yeah, I mean, it’s really interesting because they are exactly your situation. Similar menu. And we’re working on actually to simplify our menu to less items actually, but really continue with that super high quality. And he’s taking business from Five Guys, McDonald’s, all those businesses because people are now like oh I’ll sit down, eat at a restaurant for the same price.

00:17:07:14 – 00:17:11:14

Andrew Pudalov

It’s really interesting because it really stem the tide. That was 100% going the other way.

00:17:11:20 – 00:17:17:02

Zack Oates

By the way, with that, what’s your mix cut off of? Like, hey, this is on the chopping block.

00:17:17:04 – 00:17:18:18

Andrew Pudalov

Bowl and smoothie wise.

00:17:18:20 – 00:17:21:05

Zack Oates

Yeah. What do you look for with p mix percentage?

00:17:21:07 – 00:17:50:09

Andrew Pudalov

Well, it’s all about data, right? So we look at where 80% of our sales are bowls. So our business is a bowl business. So we’re still going through you know the bottom 15% to cut and just really stay with what sells and adjust. We’re doing more AES. We’re doing more interesting ingredients like mushrooms and stuff like that. And really kind of upping our game because you always have to be moving forward.

00:17:50:09 – 00:17:50:23

Andrew Pudalov

Right.

00:17:51:00 – 00:17:55:08

Zack Oates

Love that. Andrew. And how do people find and follow you.

00:17:55:10 – 00:18:25:10

Andrew Pudalov

Rush bulls.com or us HBO wls.com rush bulls.com. All the information about the companies on their free up 20 stores open between the really mostly next year. Now is through the end of this year and next year. We actually have a store opening in a nontraditional store opening in Greenville. September. Yeah. It’s exciting, I think this weekend and we opened two stores last weekend, I believe with the international market.

00:18:25:12 – 00:18:27:14

Andrew Pudalov

Not yet, actually, but.

00:18:27:18 – 00:18:28:18

Zack Oates

What’s the nontraditional.

00:18:28:18 – 00:18:47:09

Andrew Pudalov

Store that I don’t even I know the woman stay on on the international market, but she’s a really interesting woman also. But certainly there’s be information out on that. And then we’re opening in Powell, Ohio the next few weeks, and in Scottsdale.

00:18:47:11 – 00:19:07:00

Zack Oates

Oh, nice. Okay. Well, hey, Scottsdale, I may have to take a flight down there to check it out. Give me give me a excuse to go to Scottsdale. I’m there, especially in the Utah winter. But, Andrew, for leaving the boring life of finance behind to give us real, authentic food. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us on Giving Ovation.

00:19:07:02 – 00:19:10:04

Andrew Pudalov

Well, thank you for having me. Always. Great to see you.

00:19:10:06 – 00:19:32:19

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation up.com.

Frank Paci has helped shape some of the most familiar brands in food, from Burger King and Pizza Hut to McAlister’s, Corner Bakery, and Einstein Bros. Bagels. Now, as CEO of Newk’s Eatery, he is focused on a simple but demanding mission. Make it easy for guests to enjoy great food, no matter how they choose to access the brand. In this episode of Give an Ovation, Frank and Zack dive into convenience, catering, and how feedback turns into real improvement.

What Newk’s Eatery Looks Like Today (00:41)

Frank explains that Newk’s Eatery focuses on sandwiches, soups, salads, and pizzas, with a mix of dine in, to go, delivery, and a significant catering business. The goal is to meet guests where they are. As he puts it, “Part of the guest experience is meeting the guest on how they want to access the brand.”

Catering as Growth and Marketing (03:35)

Beyond being a strong revenue channel, catering doubles as a sampling engine. Guests at business meetings may be trying Newk’s for the first time. Frank calls catering “a paid for sampling program,” and notes that office catering has grown as companies bring people back on specific days and offer meals as an incentive.

Designing Simple Systems for Teams (10:11)

Frank stresses that guest experience lives or dies with execution, especially in a world of high turnover. He shares an operating system test. “When I come home, I do not have to think about which side of the garage to park on.” Restaurant systems should feel that simple, so teams can focus on service, not mental gymnastics.

Fixing the Leaky Bucket with Feedback (11:59)

Newk’s uses guest feedback to spot issues, recover experiences, and train smarter. Since adopting Ovation, they have collected hundreds of thousands of responses, with most at five stars. Frank highlights that about half of the guests who had a non five experience and were contacted have come back. One general manager even invited a guest to lunch, which led to a glowing LinkedIn post. “We do not want a leaky bucket where guests have a bad experience and do not tell anybody about it.”

Training, Tools, and Higher Ratings (14:05)

By integrating feedback with their training platform, Opus, Newk’s can act on patterns, not just one offs. Encouraging happy guests to leave public reviews has lifted online ratings by about a full star. For Frank, it all ties back to a core belief. You get convenience and consistency when you design for your people first, then let them take care of the guest.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/frank-paci-8b1a56a/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/newks-eatery/about/

https://newks.com/

https://www.instagram.com/newkseatery/?hl=en

Transcript

00:00:00:05 – 00:00:25:20

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give an Ovation, the Restaurant guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I chat with industry experts to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation. The feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn was actually happening in your restaurants and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:26:01 – 00:00:33:10

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today I’ve got a legend of the industry. Frank Pacey.

00:00:33:15 – 00:00:34:19

Frank Paci

Makes me sound old.

00:00:34:21 – 00:00:55:24

Zack Oates

Know? Well, the legend part may sound old, but once I go through your roster of brands that you have had a huge impact on. Burger King, Pizza Hut, McAlister’s Corner Bakery. Einstein’s now the CEO of nukes eatery that has over 100 locations. Frank, you have had quite the career in food. Man.

00:00:56:01 – 00:01:10:00

Frank Paci

I like to eat. What can I say? I love kind of working in the business where you’re dealing with consumers on a consumer facing basis and trying to figure out, hey, how do we give them a great experience and how do we give them a great deal? That’s really what I’ve enjoyed on my career.

00:01:10:00 – 00:01:18:11

Zack Oates

So but did I read this correctly? You started your career in the automotive industry? No, no. Where did you start? What was your first job?

00:01:18:12 – 00:01:22:11

Frank Paci

I started GE General Electric. I was in GE.

00:01:22:13 – 00:01:25:09

Zack Oates

GE oh yeah not GMG.

00:01:25:09 – 00:01:26:07

Frank Paci

Yeah I got.

00:01:26:07 – 00:01:28:02

Zack Oates

It all right. I was close to the letter I.

00:01:28:02 – 00:01:33:23

Frank Paci

Was, I was a credit and collections guy. I was repossessing TVs and decided hey restaurant sounds like a lot more fun than that.

00:01:33:23 – 00:01:41:20

Zack Oates

So Amen. There you go. So for those who aren’t familiar with nukes, walk us through the guest journey there.

00:01:41:22 – 00:02:08:10

Frank Paci

Yeah. So nukes was founded in Oxford, Mississippi. We’re right around 100 locations, mainly in the South East. Sandwiches, soups, salads and pizzas. And 45% of our business is in restaurant. And then we’ve got a significant catering business as well as to go and delivery. So in today’s world, part of the guest experience is kind of meeting the guest on how they want to access the brand.

00:02:08:10 – 00:02:27:19

Frank Paci

And so we’ve made sure that we’re able I mean, I go back to forever. It’s been quality, service value and convenience in the restaurant business. And to me, convenience today is, hey, I want to get it delivered to my house. I want to pick it up. I want to call you on the phone. I want to come in with my family and sit down.

00:02:27:19 – 00:02:39:03

Frank Paci

And so what’s really interesting is, is that it’s not just one guest experience in my mind. It’s multiple guest experiences. And how do you make sure that you’re doing each one of those as best as you can do it?

00:02:39:03 – 00:03:00:08

Zack Oates

So I love that because at the end of the day, we always talk about the ladder of loyalty, and it starts with convenience. If you can’t get past that first hurdle of convenience for the guest, you’re done. And then the next level up is consistency. And that’s something that you’ve just mastered in your career about. You got to deliver the same product the same way.

00:03:00:09 – 00:03:20:20

Frank Paci

And it becomes difficult when you have all these different service modes, right. In terms of now, fortunately, we’re in a business where most of our food travels pretty well for delivery and to go right. But that’s one of the and then have to look at packaging, right. Which was when you think about how do we have the right packaging, do we have packaging that makes it a good experience for the guests?

00:03:20:22 – 00:03:28:23

Frank Paci

So there’s all these different pieces of the guest experience that it’s a bunch of little things that turns into a big thing basically. Right.

00:03:28:23 – 00:03:35:23

Zack Oates

So and with catering, is there anything that you found that’s helped you to increase and improve catering?

00:03:36:00 – 00:03:55:14

Frank Paci

Well, a lot of our catering comes from building relationships with guests and we’ve got customers that are multiple catering. And then we also get a lot of through the easy cater. We’re out there advertising the brand on easy cater really catering. There’s a lot about execution. And right number one in catering is it’s got to be there on time, right.

00:03:55:14 – 00:04:18:08

Frank Paci

If you’re especially when you think about business to business catering and you’re having an event where you’re having a meeting if the food’s not there when you’re ready to have lunch, it was a failure. It doesn’t matter how good the food is, right? So trying to do all those things and we’re also then now utilizing deliver that to make sure that in the past we did a lot of direct delivery ourselves.

00:04:18:08 – 00:04:37:23

Frank Paci

But the challenge then becomes is you’re competing with the lunchtime guest experience in the restaurant, right? So if we can kind of offload some of these different services to other folks and make sure that it still gets there when we want it to get there, that helps us hit all the different occasions that we’re servicing in the restaurant.

00:04:37:23 – 00:05:00:14

Zack Oates

So and that catering, I think that that is something so powerful to see. That and the brands that we’re finding are doing really well right now. And by really well, I mean, like they’re up in comps, a lot of them have relied on catering, right. Because if you can do catering and you can start your day with a $2,000 order.

00:05:00:16 – 00:05:01:03

Frank Paci

Oh yeah.

00:05:01:05 – 00:05:02:20

Zack Oates

I mean, that’s pretty good.

00:05:02:22 – 00:05:20:18

Frank Paci

The serve managers love it in terms of being able to manage the PNL. Whatever. Right. You get a head start with that catering order. Obviously you’ve got to be able to execute it, but that really helps make the day in terms of getting back in order. And I also I’ve always thought about catering as kind of a paid for sampling program.

00:05:20:18 – 00:05:35:14

Frank Paci

Right. In terms of what I’m delivering to a, especially if it’s a business meeting or whatever. Not everybody there may have know what Nucs is or have been doing. Nucs. Right. And so while the food was good, where’d you get this? Oh, okay. Great. And let’s have another opportunity to go to the restaurant.

00:05:35:14 – 00:05:58:05

Zack Oates

So and that’s why people like Kelly Grogan over at crumbs, who’s helping out to do a lot of catering consulting, she is just blowing up right now. And she’s doing some incredible stuff because people are looking for those incremental ways. And there are businesses who are still providing meals, even though employees in in general, the U.S. is starting to eat out less often.

00:05:58:11 – 00:06:06:13

Zack Oates

And so catering is a great way to bolster that because everyone’s taking price. We can’t take price anymore, but you can find a different additional avenues.

00:06:06:15 – 00:06:29:12

Frank Paci

You are. The other thing that’s interesting about that is as people start to say, hey, I want employees to come back to the office. And, you know, is one of those things. One of those tools that they’ve got is we’ll come to the office on Friday. We’re going to be providing catering from Nucs for lunch on Friday, right, to say, give me an come, come give me an incentive to come to the office as opposed to sit at home and work remotely.

00:06:29:12 – 00:06:44:07

Frank Paci

Right. So there’s me there. I think there are other opportunities like that that are emerging. You know, as you as you start to see more pressure to say, hey, let’s get back in the office at least 1 or 2 days a week, three days a week, some of these places. Right. So you kind of say, okay, great. Well, you’re going to be in three days a week.

00:06:44:07 – 00:07:00:03

Frank Paci

Let’s get catering. So it’s interesting because catering was always busy. It’s like Tuesday for Thursday now. But we’ve seen a real pick up on our Friday catering. So I don’t know whether people are are doing that and that’s what’s causing that. But it’s really kind of interesting to watch that happen from a trend standpoint. So.

00:07:00:06 – 00:07:22:08

Zack Oates

Well, that’s because nobody wants to go in and hear Kevin’s story again unless it comes with the nuke sandwich. You know what I mean? Like, jeez, Kevin, I don’t know who Kevin is, just the metaphorical. But, you know, one of the things that we’ve actually seen too is some of our customers. What they’ll do is they actually will with their catering, they’ll put out a sign that will say catering provided by X company.

00:07:22:10 – 00:07:41:05

Zack Oates

How do you enjoy the food? Get $5 off your next order over there. And so what that’s doing is then, you know, let’s say you have a 30 person catering order. And to your point, that’s free advertising. But if you can get them to scan and answer just a two question survey about how they enjoyed the food, then they get a $5 coupon and they’re going to come in there.

00:07:41:07 – 00:08:00:24

Zack Oates

And typically what what data shows that if you give someone a $5 off coupon, then that person will place an order that is $7 more than your average ticket. And so it’s a win win win because they try the food, they get the $5 and you get a customer that is giving you $2 more than the coupon that you gave them.

00:08:00:24 – 00:08:02:23

Zack Oates

So it’s a pretty powerful method.

00:08:03:00 – 00:08:13:16

Frank Paci

Yeah. Typically that’s what we’ll see, is that people will take the savings and buy additional food with the savings a lot of times. Right. Just what you’re talking about in terms of the check doesn’t change just because there’s a discount on the check. Yeah.

00:08:13:16 – 00:08:22:14

Zack Oates

So but it just it just gets those people who are trying your food gets them to come into the restaurant to experience it in person as well, which is really powerful.

00:08:22:16 – 00:08:53:00

Frank Paci

Yeah. One of the challenge in today’s world is actually the marketing of the brand, right? Especially a smaller brand like us. In terms of or in the past, you would do direct mail, you do all these radio, all these other kinds of things. Now the media is so fragmented. How do you do advertising. And so we’ve always talked about, hey, the best way to do advertising is, you know, we look at putting our brand on third party, putting it on easy cater going bounce backs in store and really what you’re kind of talking about is a bounce back on catering, if you will.

00:08:53:00 – 00:09:05:00

Frank Paci

Right. And so a lot of times what you end up with, right, you end up the discount. But the expense is actually distribution of the marketing materials here. You got free marketing material distribution so you can afford to give the discount.

00:09:05:06 – 00:09:26:17

Zack Oates

So yeah. And that’s the thing is and the other thing is like if you’re going to focus on catering, you got to make sure that you’ve got the packaging and the signage. Right. Because so many people I’ve gone to places where they’ve catered and I’m eating the food and I’m like, this is great, who is this? And nobody knows because the person who ordered isn’t in the room.

00:09:26:19 – 00:09:49:08

Zack Oates

So I think it’s important to also think about with your catering program, how do you make sure that you turn that into a marketing program? Because that’s going to be what really helps drive the needle and helps increase those might be a little bit, but it’s critical to be able to get them to come in and spend their money with you, as opposed to just having their company spend their money on them.

00:09:49:08 – 00:09:50:23

Frank Paci

Right? Absolutely.

00:09:51:00 – 00:10:07:20

Zack Oates

So thinking about the guest experience here, Frank, when you think about guest experience today and you’ve had, like I said, quite the career and I’m sure that some things haven’t changed, maybe some things have changed. What do you think is the most important aspect of guest experience today?

00:10:07:22 – 00:10:26:07

Frank Paci

Obviously the biggest challenge is getting the right employees, right? I mean, at the end of the day, the person that’s going to make that difference to the guest experience is the employee, right? The employee has to have a smile, has to have a greeting. And, you know, especially for us, if you’re in restaurant, we’re delivering food to the table.

00:10:26:09 – 00:10:36:00

Frank Paci

So that’s all part of that. I would I talked about to go, you know, our biggest failure point and to go is forgetting to put something in there. Right. So you have to make.

00:10:36:00 – 00:10:45:17

Zack Oates

Sure Frank, that is so unique to Nucs. I can’t imagine that you have. But I’ve never heard of a restaurant. Have I know I never heard that.

00:10:45:17 – 00:11:04:11

Frank Paci

Right. So how do you make sure that the employee is taken care to do those kind of things? Right? So to me, it’s funny because we always talk about operating systems, right? When I was young, I was confused. So I asked one of these guys, this is know how do you explain the operating system? He says, the easiest way for me to explain the operating system was when I come home.

00:11:04:13 – 00:11:29:18

Frank Paci

I don’t have to think about which side of the garage to park on, right. In terms of it should be that simple to do that. And so the question is, how can you design the operating systems to support the fact that you’ve got huge turnover employees, you’re spending all this time training. You got to make it as simple as possible to execute to me, that’s a great part of how do you get the employees to execute on the guest experience.

00:11:29:18 – 00:11:30:09

Frank Paci

So I.

00:11:30:09 – 00:11:55:17

Zack Oates

Love that. I think that’s a great way to think about it. It’s really simple and I think that’s one of the things that, you know, it’s been really impactful as I’ve been looking in the back end of what people have been following your brand in terms of not just publicly, but also privately, like seen how many people love sharing their feedback with you, and the amount of feedback that people want to share with you is unbelievable.

00:11:55:17 – 00:11:59:11

Zack Oates

I just be curious to get your take on how has it been helpful for you?

00:11:59:13 – 00:12:04:24

Frank Paci

Since we started in August of 24, we only had 300,000 feedback, so.

00:12:05:01 – 00:12:05:15

Zack Oates

All.

00:12:05:17 – 00:12:24:00

Frank Paci

The great news is 75% of those have been a five, right? And so you got to deal with the other 25%. And some of those may be people who are just hard graders and don’t like to give a five. Right. But the big opportunity for us is to recover those guests. Right? So during that time period, we’ve had 81,000 responses that aren’t a five.

00:12:24:00 – 00:12:44:17

Frank Paci

Right. And so those are going to our DMs and allowing us to try to recover. So one of my favorite stories is we had one of our GM’s, got the feedback, sent an answer back to the guest, and the guest responded back and said, is this I because you’re thinking that it’s an automated response and not an actual person?

00:12:44:17 – 00:13:04:20

Frank Paci

And he said he then send the note back, introducing himself as the GM at the store and inviting the guest to come in and medium for, lunch at his next shift. And so the guest came in on the next shift and they had lunch together, and they wrote this great review on LinkedIn for the guy. Right. So.

00:13:04:21 – 00:13:25:16

Frank Paci

Oh, that’s awesome. You know, it’s those kind of stories where you hear those kind of things and you say, you know, that’s I mean, think about saving 40,000 customers who had a bad experience and getting them to come back. It’s over 50%, or it’s right around 50% of the people that have not had a five for us that we know have come back to us.

00:13:25:16 – 00:13:44:03

Frank Paci

Right? So we don’t want to have that leaky bucket where the guests are coming in and not getting a great experience and and not telling anybody about it. So I think one of the great things that we’ve seen with ovation is it’s so simple to do the feedback. The other thing it’s amazing is you don’t have to incentivize the guests to give you the feedback, just what you were talking about, right?

00:13:44:03 – 00:14:05:06

Frank Paci

The old systems that are out there, right. You’re given coupons to get people to give you responses here. We’re getting all these responses without having any incentive to guess. So just what you’re saying in today’s world, people want to share their experience. And the other part of that is obviously as part of the system, you know, we’re inviting the people who have positive responses to go out on the social media and give us a rating.

00:14:05:06 – 00:14:22:07

Frank Paci

So we’ve seen a life of about one point on kind of all of our ratings out there, whether Yelp or Google, as a result of inviting people who had a good experience to rate us, as opposed to I think a lot of times what you get is the people who had a bad experience and are out there rating you.

00:14:22:07 – 00:14:31:08

Frank Paci

So not not really thinking about the fact that, hey, I had a great experience. Let me go put that in somewhere. Right? So all those things seemed to work really well for us.

00:14:31:08 – 00:14:59:12

Zack Oates

So and the reason that you guys have a, you know, literally a one star increase and that’s incredible because the reason that we started ovation and by the way, the name ovation nukes, you think you are a perfect example of why I started ovation is because when you go to get a sandwich and you get the sandwich that you ordered and it’s a good sandwich, are you sitting there being like, oh my gosh, everyone, I got what I pick.

00:14:59:13 – 00:15:21:01

Zack Oates

You got to come here. I got what I paid for. No, you’re thinking, oh, that was good. I’ll order from here again. Probably. But when you make it easy for them to celebrate you and to give you that ovation that you deserve, then they’re much more likely to do it. I mean, the fact is that I don’t know if you want me to share your online rating for this last month, but it’s really impressive.

00:15:21:01 – 00:15:32:24

Zack Oates

Frank, get ready for this. If I get your permission, I’ll share it. Okay. Your average rating for the last month is 4.8 stars across Google, Yelp and TripAdvisor.

00:15:32:24 – 00:15:33:10

Frank Paci

That’s what we.

00:15:33:10 – 00:15:59:07

Zack Oates

Like. I mean, think about that. You’ve got over 100 locations. The amount of operations, the thousands and thousands of people that are coming back in or coming in and trying you out, and the millions of opportunities that your team has to mess something up because you got to get every single ingredient right. And to run. With an average of 4.8 stars, this last month is amazing.

00:15:59:07 – 00:16:18:12

Zack Oates

So kudos to you. Kudos to the team because you’re taking all of this data and actually making things better. Yes, you responding to the guests and you have an incredible response rate. Very fast response time. But it’s not just about that, but you and your team are taking that data and then fixing the problems, fixing the underlying root.

00:16:18:14 – 00:16:38:07

Frank Paci

Right. Because we you know, we look at because we’re integrated with opus, which is our training system. Right. And that we can try to identify, hey, what’s the root cause. Right. This is back to what I talked about earlier. Hey, if we’ve got a procedure that’s not right, and we can make it simpler to make sure that it’s easier to execute, to make sure that we are getting five stars.

00:16:38:07 – 00:16:44:18

Frank Paci

Every time we do that, we need to invest in those kind of things. And I think as a brand, we’ve been investing in those kind of things.

00:16:44:18 – 00:17:00:13

Zack Oates

So and it shows, man. And I just really respect you in the brand and what you’re building. And it’s been a great partnership, helping us get better as we’re helping you get better. So it’s very symbiotic there. Now, Frank, how can people find and follow you or Nucs?

00:17:00:15 – 00:17:09:20

Frank Paci

Well, obviously you go to Newcomb. You know, we’re out there, we’re on social media, but, you know, obviously the best place to go. Scott Newcomb so.

00:17:09:24 – 00:17:18:14

Zack Oates

Awesome. And by the way, last question, Frank, is there anyone in the restaurant industry that deserves an ovation who’s someone that we should be following?

00:17:18:16 – 00:17:32:10

Frank Paci

Well, I think, you know, when I look at brands out there, I look at people like Velvet Taco, which I think are doing a phenomenal job. When you start looking at what they do and to me, it’s a fun brand and they seem to be having some great success out there.

00:17:32:10 – 00:17:49:14

Zack Oates

So and I mean, and Clay Dover has done such a good job of taking that brand to the next level because they are a good product. I actually live right by a velvet taco, and I lived in Dallas and I loved going there was so good. But now that he’s taken it over, it’s been incredible to see what’s been happening there.

00:17:49:14 – 00:18:00:19

Zack Oates

So yeah, definitely velvet Taco Clay Dover a huge shout out there. Well, Frank, for showing us that convenience after all these years is still king. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and giving ovation.

00:18:00:21 – 00:18:04:12

Frank Paci

All right. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thanks for all the support you’ve given us.

00:18:04:12 – 00:18:28:23

Zack Oates

So absolutely. Thanks for joining us today. If you liked this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation up.com.

Growing a coffee brand is one thing. Growing a coffee brand that New Yorkers trust with their time is another. In this episode of Give an Ovation, Gregory Zamfotis, founder and CEO of Gregorys Coffee, joins Zack to talk about expansion, speed, product decisions, and why people are at the center of everything. From his dad’s sandwich shop in a New Jersey mall to a national partnership with Craveworthy Brands, Greg shares how he keeps the guest experience front and center as the brand scales.

Franchising with Craveworthy Brands (02:01)

Greg walks through why Gregorys chose franchising as the lever for growth after partnering with Simon Property Group to convert legacy mall locations.

“We knew once we opened these stores we were going to want to open plenty more after that. It became very obvious that franchising would be the preferred way to grow.”

Convenience Without Compromise (07:25)

Coming from busy New York lunch spots, Greg builds Gregorys around quality at speed, not one or the other.

“Why does a customer have to sacrifice just because they are getting something quicker? We put systems in place so we can deliver super high quality in the fastest amount of time possible.”

Saying Goodbye to the Donuts (11:52)

Greg explains the hard call to retire three of their top selling donuts, all based on his father’s original recipes, in order to move baking into the stores.

“We felt like this was going to be a huge upgrade. Now when you get a croissant at 7 a.m., it was baked 30 or 45 minutes ago.”

People Before Everything Else (15:25)

Greg shares the story of Cindy, a DC team member whose care shows in every pastry case she touches, and why he pushed for her growth even when she doubted herself.

“I would never ask anybody to do anything I would not do myself. It comes back to the people you serve with, shoulder to shoulder.”

Why Feedback Matters, Even When It Hurts (20:15)

From the first Yelp review to modern guest feedback tools, Greg stays close to what guests are actually saying.

“Better to know than to have the blind spot. If you do not really know how your customers are seeing you, then you are just flying blind.”

If you want a playbook on building a coffee brand that respects both the product and the clock, this episode is worth a listen.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregory-zamfotis-65589112/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/gregorys-coffee/

https://gregoryscoffee.com/

https://www.instagram.com/gregoryscoffee/?hl=en

 

Transcript

00:00:00:05 – 00:00:24:23

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give an Ovation, the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I get to chat with an industry expert to get their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurants and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:24:24 – 00:00:48:21

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation. Up.com. And today I have the man, the myth, the logo. Greg. Them photos of Gregory’s coffee. They are just blowing up all over the country. New York City based coffee brand. If you’re in New York, you know Gregory’s and now they’re in malls and different locations all around the country. So, Greg, thanks for joining us on Given Ovation.

00:00:48:21 – 00:00:49:19

Zack Oates

How are you?

00:00:49:21 – 00:00:53:14

Gregory Zamfotis

Hey, happy to be here. And yeah, doing great. Thanks for that intro.

00:00:53:16 – 00:01:13:00

Zack Oates

Well, and we have been working together for almost four years now. So this podcast is a long time coming, but I’m such a big fan of what you’ve built and what you’re building. And, recently acquired partnered with crave worthy. It’s a pretty big deal. How has that been?

00:01:13:02 – 00:01:36:24

Gregory Zamfotis

That’s been a journey. Like everything I do, it’s always interesting. So as you mentioned, we’ve grown substantially over the last couple of years. We worked on the strategic partnership with Simon Property Group, which was sort of the real kickoff to that, where we converted a number of Starbucks in their properties to Gregory’s. They just happened to be around the country where our whole store base was based in the sort of the New York and DC metro markets.

00:01:37:01 – 00:02:01:15

Gregory Zamfotis

So it was something different for us. So we’re now in Florida, Nashville, Phoenix, California, Tacoma. Some really cool markets. So we knew going into it that once we opened these stores, we’re going to want to open plenty more after that and fill in these markets with more traditional groceries, not just sort of mall property locations. So the thought was, are we going to grow these corporate or where are we going, our franchise?

00:02:01:15 – 00:02:29:02

Gregory Zamfotis

That sort of became very obvious to us very quickly that franchising would be the preferred way to grow, just because we want to get density in these markets much quicker and crave worthy is a group that had been interested in partnering with Gregory’s for a long time. The timing wasn’t quite right until more recently when we said, you know, we’re ready to do this, and they bring tons of prowess when it comes to leveraging franchising as a lever to grow.

00:02:29:04 – 00:02:38:20

Gregory Zamfotis

So we came together and they’re helping us do that now. So we’re kicking off that process and hope to be franchising in 2026.

00:02:38:22 – 00:02:59:02

Zack Oates

That’s awesome. And you know I’ve got a lot of respect for Matthew Skyy and what he’s built over there. And he’s had such a incredible career and it’s amazing what he’s done because he and I are like almost the same age and I feel like he’s lived like three lives. So it’s great to see that. Now, by the way, are you originally from Jersey?

00:02:59:04 – 00:03:05:24

Gregory Zamfotis

Marginally from Brooklyn. But then I moved to new Jersey, like I was like 10 or 11 years old, so.

00:03:06:01 – 00:03:13:04

Zack Oates

Okay, well, just because the way you said mall sounded very Jersey, a little less New York. And so, you know, my father had.

00:03:13:04 – 00:03:30:18

Gregory Zamfotis

A sandwich shop in a mall in new Jersey. And that’s where I really, you know, while I worked for him my whole life, were really sort of cut my teeth and is in high school is when I started working most of my weekends and breaks for my dad at his place in a food court in the Freehold Raceway Mall in New Jersey.

00:03:30:23 – 00:03:31:04

Gregory Zamfotis

So.

00:03:31:04 – 00:03:39:20

Zack Oates

Okay. Yeah. So is that where you learned your love for Cinnabon as well? Because I feel like that was back in the day when Cinnabon and Chick fil A were just like mall spots.

00:03:39:22 – 00:03:52:15

Gregory Zamfotis

Yeah, yeah. Cinnabon was was huge. Auntie Anne’s pretzels. You find them in many mall properties for sure. We used to like a Nathan’s hot dogs next to us. Sbarro pizza, all the hits. Everybody was in there.

00:03:52:17 – 00:04:12:14

Zack Oates

Yeah, I love that. Now, one thing that I really want to clear up for our listeners, if you look up and by the way, Gregorys Coffee is one of the few stickers that I actually have on my laptop because it’s such a cool logo and it really is if you’ve never seen it yet to look it up, especially if you can watch the clip of Greg here, because it really is him.

00:04:12:14 – 00:04:22:09

Zack Oates

It’s like his glasses and his hair. And what happens, Greg, when you want to like, change your style up, what happens when you want a new hairdo?

00:04:22:11 – 00:04:33:07

Gregory Zamfotis

Oh man. You know, I get this question a lot. So unsurprisingly, I have more than one pair of glasses. They just tend to be thick rim. The shape has changed over the years.

00:04:33:09 – 00:04:34:14

Zack Oates

My hair.

00:04:34:16 – 00:04:47:23

Gregory Zamfotis

I guess the main thing is just. I hope I don’t go bald, because I think that’s where the problem comes in right now. As long as it’s kind of like up there doing some bit of a mess, then it kind of ties in. So I am a little bit pigeonholed, but it’s been working for me for a while.

00:04:48:00 – 00:05:07:12

Zack Oates

Yeah. Well, obviously so good for you on that one. And the other thing I want to clear up though, is there is and this is something that we always train our people on when they start up at ovation. And if they’re going to be working with you, there is no apostrophe. This is the plural of Gregory’s. There are a lot of Gregory’s.

00:05:07:12 – 00:05:10:00

Zack Oates

It’s not his coffee shop. Right?

00:05:10:02 – 00:05:23:21

Gregory Zamfotis

It’s not mine. It’s yours. That’s part of it. The other part was we just liked that looked. It looked better without the apology. When we were building our first sign in 2006. Right. Starbucks doesn’t have an apology, right? That’s named after Starbuck from Moby Dick. So.

00:05:23:22 – 00:05:26:14

Zack Oates

Oh, I actually didn’t even know that.

00:05:26:16 – 00:05:30:12

Gregory Zamfotis

Yeah. Come on, man. Starbuck, I guess who’s the first mate in Moby Dick?

00:05:30:17 – 00:05:39:12

Zack Oates

Oh, my gosh. I’ve read two books about Starbuck, so I never even like either I missed it in those books or they didn’t talk to me. Don’t. Well, it’s why the mermaid.

00:05:39:12 – 00:05:48:12

Gregory Zamfotis

You know, the mermaid. The novel thing, it’s all from Moby Dick originally, but you don’t really talk about it that much. But that’s part of the launch, I guess.

00:05:48:14 – 00:06:05:23

Zack Oates

Okay. Because as I was prepping for this podcast, I wanted to make sure that listeners knew that there was no apostrophe because I was a hot, deep, clean man. Yeah. And he does. I mean, the logo looks really slick, and I think I like having that apostrophe in there. We just like, kind of like, throw it off.

00:06:06:00 – 00:06:26:19

Gregory Zamfotis

Yeah. The grammar heads out there are never going to be happy with the decision, but make it work. It’s like, you know, the famous place, the ear in lower Manhattan. It’s like it was a neon or a sign that weirdly said bar. But part of the be like broke off. So it looked more like ear. So they just started calling themselves ear in just because the sign got messed up there.

00:06:26:19 – 00:06:30:02

Gregory Zamfotis

Yeah. Instead of changing the sign, we’ll just change the name.

00:06:30:04 – 00:06:48:06

Zack Oates

Sure. There we go. You know, some things change organically. Some things never change. Like you got to make swirlies. Oh, yeah. Mean, that’s a pretty dark. Yeah, exactly. Light or dark? For those of you who don’t drink alcohol, if you asked for nonalcoholic beer there and they say light or dark, they’re not asking you what kind of nonalcoholic beer you want.

00:06:48:06 – 00:07:06:08

Zack Oates

I unfortunately had the experience of asking for nonalcoholic beer, and they brought me a real beer, and I quickly realized it. But then when I asked for, he’s like, well, what do you want, a soda? And I was like, yeah, I’d love would it? So they brought me out a lukewarm can, a ginger ale that he cleaned with his t shirt and then put on the counter.

00:07:06:08 – 00:07:25:13

Zack Oates

So anyway, if you’re in New York and after you get some coffee, you want a beer? McSorley, this is great if you don’t drink. A mixer is not great, but it’s still historic. So let’s talk about that whole vibe. The whole guest experience. What do you think, Greg is one of the most important aspects of guest experience nowadays.

00:07:25:15 – 00:07:52:02

Gregory Zamfotis

Some things never change. I think it’s sort of respecting the guests, their time, why they’re there, and then sort of solving backwards for it. Right? Like, what do we have to do to meet the customer where they’re at? I was raised in a food and service family. Right. My father had fast casual concepts in New York City my entire life, and it was drilled into me from a very, very young age that we needed to crush the lunch rush.

00:07:52:02 – 00:08:08:02

Gregory Zamfotis

That’s how you made your money back in the day. I still do in many restaurants in New York City, but the only way you’re going to do that is you got to be fast. You have to be really great product, great service. Your restaurant has to be clean. You have to do all those things in a really busy setting because again, that was what that customer wanted.

00:08:08:02 – 00:08:34:18

Gregory Zamfotis

The lunch customer in the busy parts of New York City, those are the elements that are super important to them. If you could do all those things well, you’ll tend to have a great business. So that always sort of resonated with me and stuck, which is why when we launched Gregory’s, our point of view is different than a lot of the other specialty coffee concepts out there, because everybody was just honed in hardcore on quality and products, which is right, and they should do that.

00:08:34:22 – 00:08:54:10

Gregory Zamfotis

We do that too, but they sort of turned a blind eye to a lot of other things that I think people really value in their experience. No matter who we talk to or what surveys we do, convenience is almost always at the top of folks list when it comes to coffee. It might not always be their first preferential item, but it’s always an important factor.

00:08:54:10 – 00:09:19:04

Gregory Zamfotis

Access to the location speed. Now we know. Obviously drive thrus are popular for a reason. The most convenient thing you don’t have to get out of a car. So we said, well, why can’t we do both? Why don’t we focus on throughput but also not sacrifice quality? So that was our point of view 20 years ago. And that’s remains our point of view today, is why does a customer have to sacrifice just because they’re getting something quicker, right.

00:09:19:04 – 00:09:48:03

Gregory Zamfotis

So we put systems in place. We use tools. We train our people. We do all these things to ensure we can deliver super high quality in the fastest amount of time possible. Not everybody is actually looking to rush. We don’t want to rush them. But I would always say why not give that time back to somebody? So if they say, hey, I don’t mind if I get my product in 2 or 3 minutes or 7 or 8 minutes, but if they can get it quicker and then they could choose what they want to do with those extra minutes, they could stay, have their coffee hang out, they could get on their way and going.

00:09:48:03 – 00:10:05:14

Gregory Zamfotis

But I never want the people to say, well, there’s a flaw, right? It’s always going to be ten, 15 minutes to get my products, whether I’m coming in rush or non rush, because I would think about it. Well, if I’ve got a lunch break 30 minutes, by the time I get out of the office or whatever I’m doing, I get to where I need to go.

00:10:05:16 – 00:10:24:21

Gregory Zamfotis

If it’s going to take 15 or 20 minutes to get my product, and then I have to turn around and go, all of a sudden that kind of eats up my entire ability to take my break. I’m not going to come back to this place anymore. So I’m saying, why don’t I try and execute at a higher level than what other folks were doing, specifically those that were focused on quality and solving for it that way?

00:10:24:21 – 00:10:42:07

Gregory Zamfotis

Because again, I’m looking at what do I want again? There’s also maybe another element to this is selling to myself and making sure whatever I’m doing or we’re doing as a company resonates with me as well. I like I value my time. I am the classic New Yorker. I look in and I see a busy line at a place.

00:10:42:07 – 00:11:00:24

Gregory Zamfotis

If I don’t feel confident they can move a line, I just I don’t do it. I’m not the guy that waits in long lines or 45 minutes for a slice of pizza, or just I’ll never do it. So I don’t want to be turning off customers that are like me, let’s say like, oh, I wouldn’t. I want to feel like I’m going to be serviced in a relatively reasonable amount of time.

00:11:01:05 – 00:11:08:17

Gregory Zamfotis

You know, it doesn’t have to be instant, but it also doesn’t have to feel like you’re watching paint dry, which is what it could feel like sometimes waiting in some of these lines.

00:11:08:19 – 00:11:36:01

Zack Oates

And I think that you have such an interesting balance. There’s a story that I have told dozens of times. I’ve told your story dozens of times. I’d love to hear it from you, but it to me shows such a discipline and it shows that you really care about the guest experience more so. And like, you have this balancing act of like, okay, I want to create efficiencies to create a great guest experience, but that means I’m going to have to sacrifice something else.

00:11:36:03 – 00:11:52:16

Zack Oates

And I’d love for you to talk through how you thought about getting rid of the donuts, because this, to me was so powerful, because I know how special that recipe was to you and your family. And so, yeah. Do you want to tell us that story?

00:11:52:18 – 00:12:18:11

Gregory Zamfotis

Yeah. For sure. That’s certainly not the only time we’ve had to make a decision like this. So we have a central commissary where we prepare, roast our coffee. Also word for pair, most of our foods. And for the majority of the time here at Gregory’s, every single baked good was made from scratch, baked fresh at that commissary overnight and then delivered to our cafes, our stores to be used in the morning.

00:12:18:13 – 00:12:42:04

Gregory Zamfotis

One of the results of Covid was we had to think through production, make use of our space. But also we’re growing is becoming harder and harder for that facility to make products, all those products every single day. But one of our most popular, a number of our most popular pastry items were our donuts. We had a classic sour dough glazed donut, a whole wheat chai donut, and an apple fritter.

00:12:42:06 – 00:13:04:15

Gregory Zamfotis

So we had those three donuts, which were probably three of our top five selling bakery items. All three were recipes from my father’s first business. He dropped out of Brooklyn College in the 70s to take over the donut shop he was running in South Brooklyn. So again, these are 55 year old recipes that he always loved, and we started using them at Gregory’s at some point, and people loved them.

00:13:04:15 – 00:13:19:20

Gregory Zamfotis

They stood the test of time. But the problem was, once we decided we wanted to move the baking and production in store as opposed to the commissary, we could no longer do donuts, donuts or fried, right? So at least the way that we were doing them, we weren’t going to put fryers and hoods in all of our stores.

00:13:19:23 – 00:13:39:24

Gregory Zamfotis

We had ovens, convection oven so we could bake off fresh. So we felt like this was going to be a huge upgrade for our guests by being able to deliver an even fresher product. So while we were still making the products from scratch, baking it in our own facility were still baked at a remote facility and it was probably 12 to 18 hours before.

00:13:39:24 – 00:13:58:03

Gregory Zamfotis

Whereas now when you get a croissant at Gregory’s at 7 a.m., it was baked 30, 45 minutes ago. Right. It’s a fresh product. So it was a hard decision to say, well, we got to eliminate some of our customer’s favorite items. But, you know, we truly believed in the decision that we were going to elevate the experience for the guests.

00:13:58:08 – 00:14:14:19

Gregory Zamfotis

They would appreciate the fact that they were getting of truly fresh made product. They were happy to see it. The ovens were right behind the pace. Your case, they’re watching that product coming out. Honestly, the smell too, like you can’t get away from you. Open the oven door when you’re baking fresh croissants or fresh chocolate chip cookies. I mean, it’s intoxicating.

00:14:14:19 – 00:14:37:18

Gregory Zamfotis

So it was another side benefit of having that in the store. But we thought that while the customers might bristle at this overall it was going to be a better experience, better product and a better overall target for what the customers think were going for, which was how can we make our bakery program rise closer to the level of our coffee program, which we felt was elite?

00:14:37:18 – 00:14:51:16

Gregory Zamfotis

Amazing people love it, but obviously they’re watching us make that product right on the spot. So we want to do that with the baked goods too. So unfortunately, we had to say goodbye to those donuts. The recipes are still there. We can use them maybe at some point, but right now that’s not in the cards.

00:14:51:18 – 00:15:16:08

Zack Oates

That discipline of taking that family recipe that meant a lot to you. And, you know, you could have sat there and argued like, no, this is Gregory’s coffee. Like, this is part of our DNA. But Gregory isn’t the part of the DNA. It’s the guest experience that’s part of the DNA. And I love that you were able to kind of pull out your desires and your want and put the guest first.

00:15:16:14 – 00:15:25:06

Zack Oates

And that really, I think, shines through. Like when you when you go to a Gregory’s coffee, like it shows that the guest experience is paramount.

00:15:25:08 – 00:15:46:21

Gregory Zamfotis

Yeah, that’s 100% true. I just had this sort of reminder yesterday about how much people matter. Not just our guests, but our team. I was in our DC and one of my favorite team members of all time, team member named Cindy. She’s one of our team leaders down one of our DC locations. And it’s like, again, talk about baked goods.

00:15:46:23 – 00:16:05:09

Gregory Zamfotis

Any time I’m at a store that Cindy is at, the pastry case is undeniably perfect. I couldn’t set it up better myself, and she truly gets it and cares. We’ve putting that little extra love as to how you’re baking like you could bake. It’s like, hey, 20 minutes is the recommended time for these cookies. Make sure you take it out.

00:16:05:11 – 00:16:21:02

Gregory Zamfotis

Then there’s also people that say like, well, I want to check in. I’m not going to take it out. So 20 minutes and 30s because I don’t see the proper amount of browning and the texture isn’t right. Like she truly gets it. And cares. And it’s like something about her little touch. But again, that comes back to she cares.

00:16:21:02 – 00:16:40:14

Gregory Zamfotis

She’s just such a good person. She’s a native Spanish speaker and she always struggled early on speaking English, so she never felt like she could move up at Gregory’s or any other business because of her limitations with the language. But I had told her supervisor that I’m like, you know, I don’t even care about that. This is a person you need to reward.

00:16:40:14 – 00:16:57:08

Gregory Zamfotis

She works so hard. She is honestly a bright light anytime. I mean, she’s maybe not the most confident English speaker, but she definitely can communicate effectively with our team and with guests. And she’s never let me down ever. So again, we continue to move her up. We got to see her yesterday chat a little bit again, like clockwork.

00:16:57:08 – 00:17:16:11

Gregory Zamfotis

I go in the pastry case looks absolutely perfect and she’s just rocking and rolling. So I believed in her, even when maybe she didn’t believe in herself. And that’s also just something that, for me is just how we think about this business. It comes back to the people, not just the people we serve, but the people we serve with alongside with shoulder to shoulder.

00:17:16:13 – 00:17:33:13

Gregory Zamfotis

And for me, I never put anything beneath me. You’ll see me plunging toilets. You’ll see me sweeping and mopping. You probably see me behind the bar because I just love making coffee, so I can’t help myself sometimes to my own detriment. If I’m dressed nicely. I have a meeting. I have to meet with a lawyer. For whatever reason.

00:17:33:13 – 00:17:53:16

Gregory Zamfotis

I have to wear a white shirt and a tie, and I might wind up getting a splattered espresso on me because I was behind the bar for 20 minutes helping the team out, or just something that I can’t help myself. I just genuinely love the product. I love serving the guests, being shoulder to shoulder with our team, and whether it’s doing any of those things or if something just needs to get done.

00:17:53:18 – 00:18:09:02

Gregory Zamfotis

I wouldn’t ask anybody to do anything I wouldn’t do myself. I think my team truly believes that because I show them that every single day. So that’s sort of the kind of organization I always wanted to set up and how I want the people to feel. So you’re not just going to see me sitting on the side counting money.

00:18:09:02 – 00:18:24:00

Gregory Zamfotis

You’re not paying attention to folks like, I really want to be rubbing shoulders and digging in with the team. And it sort of creates that culture of that’s how we think about the world. We want to help each other. It tends to lead to better experiences for the guests that you are not, you know, have to tell them, treat that person right.

00:18:24:00 – 00:18:39:15

Gregory Zamfotis

But people tend to do those things when they’re in a great culture or great environment and they feel good, right? If they’re feeling that they’re beaten down, or that kind of supervisor or a boss who doesn’t make them feel good or yelling, they’re not going to then turn around to be smiling and giving the best experience to you guys because they don’t want to be there.

00:18:39:21 – 00:18:57:04

Gregory Zamfotis

I still would love to figure out how to be doing like daily and scores with our team. So like, how do they feel when they come in the shift to how they feel when they leave the shift and really see how are we meeting them where they’re at? Right. Like it’s just as important for me to serve our guests as to, like, make our team feel they’re great and enjoying the time on the shift.

00:18:57:04 – 00:19:14:00

Gregory Zamfotis

If they start the shift at a nine and leave it a six, that something’s wrong. Like, what did we do with something one off happen with a guest? Or is it something that we’re doing that’s not making their experience with us positive? So these are some of the things I think about do. Again, I know you’re into the data and all that stuff too, and certainly with customer sentiment.

00:19:14:00 – 00:19:22:24

Gregory Zamfotis

But team sentiment is something that I think is almost as important because they go hand in hand. You can’t have a great customer service of your team, isn’t it?

00:19:23:01 – 00:19:41:08

Zack Oates

Well, we should talk about that. Great, because I’d love to even just like, run an experiment with you on leveraging, because we have a kiosk survey as well that we don’t normally use for front of house anymore, but something that we should definitely try in the back of house. I mean, I know that you guys are the reason that we have a call to tech solution.

00:19:41:08 – 00:20:00:17

Zack Oates

I mean, we met with you three years ago, right about a year after you guys started working with us, and we’re like, hey, we’re thinking about doing something different with our phones. And so we built that together. And it’s been an amazing solution and solving a lot of problems. And over the years, I think you guys have been instrumental in providing a lot of feedback and just really appreciate your partnership.

00:20:00:17 – 00:20:07:20

Zack Oates

And talking about getting in the weeds. I mean, like usually at your size, there’s a lot of CEOs that don’t really care about the guest feedback.

00:20:07:20 – 00:20:10:12

Gregory Zamfotis

I read those things. I care about this stuff. Yeah.

00:20:10:14 – 00:20:15:10

Zack Oates

So I’d love for you to just tell me, like, how has it been helpful for you to kind of keep a pulse on things?

00:20:15:12 – 00:20:33:19

Gregory Zamfotis

I mean, it’s just exactly that. I actually read the emails. I actually read the feedback. It’s important to me to understand what’s working and what’s not. Nobody likes to read bad reviews, right? It doesn’t help. That doesn’t make you feel good, but better to know than to have the blind spot, right? Like, just say like, well, what are we going to do about this?

00:20:33:20 – 00:20:59:23

Gregory Zamfotis

It’s like a secret shopper report to understand what are the guest saying? And I remember way back in the day when Yelp was first starting out and reviews, you know, online reviews and really exist. I remember the first time I got a review posted on Yelp about our first store. It might have been a three star review because I think the something was like the guest was upset that there was crumbs on the table when they got there, and I remember trying to reach out to up to like, take this thing down.

00:20:59:23 – 00:21:13:17

Gregory Zamfotis

Like, I don’t know why this why are there things about posted about my business that I have no say in or like and I do is new at that. I was like 20 years ago. It didn’t exist. And like, no, sorry, we can’t take it down. And then I sort of realized what it was, which is sort of like a window into the store.

00:21:13:17 – 00:21:29:05

Gregory Zamfotis

And yes, every not every person is going to be giving a fully accurate or whatever descriptions, their own personal experience. But that person felt that kind of way. So it drove them to leave a review. So it should just sort of drive us to be better at what we do, to sort of make less reasons for somebody to not want to leave a five star review.

00:21:29:05 – 00:21:57:22

Gregory Zamfotis

Right? So that’s the goal. And getting more data points, more information just helps us strengthen and become a better company, a better service model, better team. So for a lot of things, we don’t have the data, we don’t have the information. It’s hard to understand where the opportunity is, but using a tool like ovation, having those insights come in so frequently across the portfolio, you can dive in and truly get a sense of what’s going on.

00:21:57:24 – 00:22:17:15

Gregory Zamfotis

Again, as you scale to it’s another challenge. You have 1 or 2 stores, maybe you might not realize how much you’re missing, but you might have a pretty good sense of what’s going on just by being in the store or the restaurant all those hours and paying close attention to how things are feeling, even though sometimes, again, as you know, customers don’t always say it, they might write it to you, but they wouldn’t tell you to your face.

00:22:17:17 – 00:22:39:14

Gregory Zamfotis

But as you scale, it becomes much harder. And that’s what I found as we started going from two, three, five, ten stores, it was impossible for me to really understand how the customers were feeling across the portfolio. So to have this at your disposal is sort of the non-negotiable at this point. It’s like if you don’t really know how your customers are seeing you, then you’re just flying blind.

00:22:39:20 – 00:23:03:18

Gregory Zamfotis

Yeah, you might be doing well, and I’ve spoken to other operators or restaurant groups that are doing well, but there’s certainly opportunities or things that could be better. And I think that’s what I’ve seen. There’s maybe my one of the bigger lessons I learned was over the years, you can’t ever relax because things change or things change quickly and you don’t want to be caught flat footed because like, we had some stores that were killing it so busy.

00:23:03:18 – 00:23:16:05

Gregory Zamfotis

But in the back of my mind, I always knew there was something with the leader. Maybe it wasn’t as strong as I would have hoped. There was issues at the store, but I didn’t really want to mess with it because the store was doing so well. But the real reason probably was the fact that it was a great location.

00:23:16:05 – 00:23:33:12

Gregory Zamfotis

There wasn’t as much competition around, so we had this sort of like monopoly situation going on where there was nowhere else to go. And the minute a competitor opened nearby, like, like things just dropped because we just weren’t strong enough or operating at the level that I know we should have. So I never want to have that happen again.

00:23:33:12 – 00:23:59:18

Gregory Zamfotis

I’m so like, you know, now when there’s smoke, you got to make sure there’s no fire. So whether it’s poor reviews or some slippage on KPIs or whatever, it is a negative sentiment. Let’s just try and get that out as quickly as possible because you never know, right? Like things might be great today, but things change in a blink and you don’t want to be caught not being resilient enough or able to withstand challenges for either macro economic challenges or direct threats.

00:23:59:18 – 00:24:22:03

Gregory Zamfotis

Right? People are ruthless, right? I have a coffee shop competitors that like out of a whole city, however many tens, hundreds of thousands of locations like they’ll open up next door to you, they just don’t care. But again, I would also say that only tends to happen if people perceive you as not so strong. I wouldn’t open up the next to somebody if I thought they were great operation to them, like, well, why would I do that?

00:24:22:03 – 00:24:38:16

Gregory Zamfotis

But so if I’m ever perceived to be weak, that’s another thing to say. Like, well, why would this company come near me? They see an opportunity because I think they could take my market share. So from a competitive standpoint is how do I continue to build a moat or how do I make people say, like, I don’t want to go anywhere near a Gregory’s because they’re doing such a great job, right?

00:24:38:16 – 00:24:54:12

Gregory Zamfotis

So you have to have that mentality too. And like all these things like, you know, iron sharpens iron, right? Like, you know, by taking the hard feedback, take a deep look at what’s going well, but also like an even deeper look at what’s not going well. And how do you tighten that up and make sure there’s visibility and options.

00:24:54:12 – 00:24:56:02

Gregory Zamfotis

A great tool to be able to do that?

00:24:56:04 – 00:25:20:23

Zack Oates

Well, appreciate that, because I think that like it is sometimes hard to eat crow and it’s tough to sit there and like read some of the feedback that’s negative. Realizing that it’s a much smaller percentage of the total feedback, but that negative feedback is stuff that needs to get take action on right now. Right. And that’s why, you know, when we send the the daily weekly emails, we like to remind people of, hey, here’s how many positive surveys you got as well.

00:25:21:00 – 00:25:39:08

Zack Oates

But I think at the end of the day, it’s like yesterday, for example, I’m counting my calories right now and last night as I was going to bed, I had three, like gummy bears, New York, peppermint Patty, and I didn’t put those in my calorie tracker. But guess what? It doesn’t change the truth. It doesn’t matter. They’re still data shows.

00:25:39:08 – 00:25:50:23

Zack Oates

Yeah, right. It’s like the truth is the truth. And so to your point, it’s much better to know what’s going on so you can act on it as opposed to hoping that it’s not happening.

00:25:51:03 – 00:26:07:19

Gregory Zamfotis

It’s being honest with yourself. Right. You’re not doing yourself any favors by not seeing the truth. Right. So whether it’s putting the accurate things in because then when you look back like, oh yeah, I only I did, I was on track like, no you were I deviated and I’m sort of the cheating. Right. So you know, if I’m only looking at the positive reviews, what how am I going to learn?

00:26:07:19 – 00:26:17:08

Gregory Zamfotis

How am I going to get better? Right. That’s that’s just not how how I would approach it or how others. I would recommend taking that free feedback as much as you can and using it as a tool to improve.

00:26:17:08 – 00:26:22:00

Zack Oates

I love that. Well, Greg, how can people find and follow you and Gregory’s coffee?

00:26:22:05 – 00:26:47:07

Gregory Zamfotis

So Gregory’s coffee, you could find it pretty simple. Gregory’s coffee.com are handles at Gregory’s Coffee on all the channels. Again, no apostrophe. So at Gregory’s Coffee, on all those TikTok Instagram x, I guess you call now Facebook, etc.. Me personally, you could find me my first name and my last name at Gregory’s am Fotis. I’m probably most, although I’m not very active on on on many of the channels.

00:26:47:11 – 00:27:06:17

Gregory Zamfotis

Starting to become a little bit more LinkedIn, Instagram X so I’m on Twitter. I mean, I’m on TikTok. I just haven’t posted or done anything just yet, but I’m there and should probably be on Substack soon, so you could probably find me there too. But yeah, maybe Instagram is the most likely place to find me right now that I’m actually doing so.

00:27:06:19 – 00:27:16:09

Zack Oates

I’m loving it. Well, Greg, despite being the logo for always putting the guest above yourself, today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and giving ovation.

00:27:16:11 – 00:27:18:19

Gregory Zamfotis

Thanks, man. Appreciate it.

00:27:18:21 – 00:27:41:07

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation Ofcom.

Brianne Harvey, founder and CEO of Break Bread Consulting, joins Zack Oates to share how tech can lift hospitality without replacing it. After nearly 25 years in the industry, she builds systems that free teams to deliver the small moments guests remember. From reservation notes to after-hours call routing, Brianne shows how simple tools can drive loyalty and revenue.

From Saint Thomas to systems (01:17)

Brianne’s path runs through front-of-house roles, fine dining, and a year living in Saint Thomas before turning to consulting.

“I love new projects. I set things up, get the process right, then move to the next challenge.”

Why Break Bread (01:46)

Her firm “bolts on” to restaurant teams to implement and manage tech, then trains operators to own it.

“We’re an extension of your team until you’re ready to fly on your own.”

Authenticity over automation (05:04)

Tech should disappear into the experience, not replace humans.

“I want systems that help my staff make moments, not take their place.”

Who they help and how (06:49)

Chef-driven, full-service, emerging groups often need hands-on setup and process design.

“You feel the growing pains at five plus locations. We stabilize, streamline, and hand back the keys.”

Tiny touches, big loyalty (09:56)

Use reservation notes and off-prem extras to make guests feel known.

“If I always order Sauvignon Blanc, note it. A small surprise in delivery can lock in the next order.”

Answer the phone, always (10:55)

Route calls to text or info after hours so guests never hit a dead end.

“Voicemail and endless rings cost you money. Give fast paths to ordering and answers.”

By treating technology as a quiet helper, Brianne keeps the focus on people. Train teams, capture guest details, remove friction, and invest in the little things. That’s how restaurants turn visits into relationships.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/briannemharvey/

https://www.breakbreadconsulting.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/break-bread-consulting/about/

Transcript

00:00:00:04 – 00:00:26:05

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give An Ovation the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I get to chat with an industry expert to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurant and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:26:07 – 00:00:51:10

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today we have Briana Harvey, founder and CEO of Break Bread Consulting. She’s had an extensive career living all over the country, and I just found out world and really excited to have you on the podcast to talk about what you’re doing and how technology can help improve the guest experience. But first, I just need to talk about this first because I thought that was so cool.

00:00:51:12 – 00:00:57:19

Zack Oates

I was like, oh, so where have you lived? And so she started rattling off these places. It was like, oh, okay. Yeah, that sounds normal. That sounds normal. And then she’s like.

00:00:58:00 – 00:00:58:17

Brianne Harvey

Saint Thomas.

00:00:58:22 – 00:01:04:15

Zack Oates

Saint Thomas. It’s like, wow, how long ago did you live in Saint Thomas?

00:01:04:17 – 00:01:17:02

Brianne Harvey

Oh, that’s probably a decade ago now, but it was for a year and amazing. And got to be on a beach, like every day off and go island hopping and it was beautiful. If you’ve never been, definitely go. It’s gorgeous.

00:01:17:04 – 00:01:33:20

Zack Oates

I know I told her I was like, that sounds really nice, just to like, get up and go away for a year and live on the beach. And I was like, I’m sure my wife would love that. But, you know, unfortunately, I miss her too much, so. Oh yeah. And we have four kids, but details. Details, right. Well, Brian, I’m super excited to have you on.

00:01:33:20 – 00:01:46:05

Zack Oates

And in looking at first of all, you’ve got a great LinkedIn presence. Everyone should follow her. We’re going to talk about that at the end. But tell me about Break Bread Consulting about what you’re doing.

00:01:46:07 – 00:02:03:11

Brianne Harvey

Yeah. So when I came back from the island, I decided to dive into consulting, worked in the restaurant industry my whole career, and really in the front of house realm. So I did, you know, host and server and bartender, front of house management, director of ops, like, that kind of region. And I really like new projects and getting things set up.

00:02:03:11 – 00:02:22:21

Brianne Harvey

And I was always a person within my restaurant group that would be setting up the POS or figuring out why things aren’t working, and I just saw that continuing to grow as as I got through my career, people were struggling with navigating technology as it grew within the restaurant and started to touching more things, and saw that as an opportunity to really help more restaurants.

00:02:23:00 – 00:02:41:07

Brianne Harvey

I liked being in the restaurant, but the day to day was a struggle for me. I like the new projects and setting things up and getting the process in place and then moving on to the next thing. So I thought consulting was going to be a great fit, and technology was growing and changing and difficult, and I thought it was just going to be a great niche for me to manage.

00:02:41:07 – 00:03:01:21

Brianne Harvey

So I decided to focus on that about 12 years ago and started Break Bread, really just as a place for me to have those services. But it’s grown into a team of these people just like me, who’ve been in the restaurant and hospitality industry and been managers and been chefs, and they have these skills that are phenomenal. But they have a life outside of restaurants as well.

00:03:01:21 – 00:03:18:08

Brianne Harvey

And like, they might have kids now and and they want to be on their feet for, you know, 12 hours a day or they can’t be on their feet for 12 hours anymore. And so they found a home here at Break Bread. And we focused on helping restaurants implement new systems, continue to manage them appropriately and just offer support any way we can.

00:03:18:08 – 00:03:28:21

Brianne Harvey

We our hearts are still in the industry, and this is kind of our forever home, and we’re able to take those expertise and get them back to restaurants, which I think is really a great kind of full circle thing with my career.

00:03:28:23 – 00:03:48:12

Zack Oates

I love that because I love that you have the experience that you’ve been in the industry, and now you’ve kind of gone out there and built the tech or built the things that you knew, that you felt the gaps of, that you were fill in the gaps and you’re like, well, hey, this is something that everybody needs. So let’s do that.

00:03:48:12 – 00:04:11:13

Zack Oates

Because I feel like so often with a lot of people who are trying to be consultants or they build tech, they’ve never actually worked in a restaurant, and it’s a different experience, and they think they know it because they’re a consumer, right? Because they go into restaurants. And so there’s so many like restaurant tech startups of like, oh, we’re solving this problem for this person.

00:04:11:19 – 00:04:28:08

Zack Oates

But it’s like, all right. That actually just creates more of a problem because you don’t understand the whole backdrop of everything that goes on behind the curtain. So I think that’s absolutely critical to have that experience. And I love that because how many years did you work in restaurants?

00:04:28:10 – 00:04:43:12

Brianne Harvey

Have been almost 25 years in the in the restaurant and hospitality industry. So about 15 in the restaurant itself. And now I’ve done about 15 out because there’s a bit of overlap as well. When I was starting my business, I was still serving tables at night and then working consulting during the day, and I did that for about 6 or 7 years.

00:04:43:12 – 00:04:53:09

Brianne Harvey

In the beginning. So I had a hard time letting go. I think more than anything, my consulting business is going well, but I was like, I’m going to miss this too much. Yeah, let’s try.

00:04:53:11 – 00:05:04:03

Zack Oates

So well, brain, as you’re thinking about from both a technology standpoint and a boots on the ground front of house standpoint, what do you think is some of the most important aspects of guest experience?

00:05:04:05 – 00:05:25:12

Brianne Harvey

I mean, personally, like I like when technology drops away. So there’s a lot of tech out there. Could do a lot of amazing things. But for me, the most important thing with guest experience is always authenticity is having that hospital quality first mindset, not tech, replacing the human at every step I possibly can to save money on labor, you lose out.

00:05:25:12 – 00:05:45:19

Brianne Harvey

What makes being in the restaurant so special? And it’s that hospitality. It’s that people first in history. And so I like finding the systems that are going to aid in my employees and aid in the guest experience and really bring that to the next level to. I grew up in kind of like the fine dining or the approaching fine dining, the high end steak houses.

00:05:45:19 – 00:06:04:17

Brianne Harvey

I work for Ruth’s Chris, I work for Cameron Mitchell Restaurant Group. I really learn that you’re finding a way to make the guest experience special. You’re finding that unique aspect of how are they going to remember me? How are they going to remember this experience? And not because I’m sitting there telling jokes tableside, but how are you going to make their moment and their experience special?

00:06:04:17 – 00:06:20:22

Brianne Harvey

And really, whether it be like flower petals on a table for their anniversary or a champagne toaster, I think one time it was a child’s birthday and they were going to a Taylor Swift concert. So we printed out a birthday card that had Taylor Swift on it, and the whole staff signed it and left it at the table.

00:06:20:22 – 00:06:37:15

Brianne Harvey

And it’s like, how do you take it to the next level and show that love and care and everything that is the hospitality industry. And so it’s that authenticity that you come back to that really doesn’t have a lot to do with tech. But my tech is like helping find different ways to enable that. Really.

00:06:37:17 – 00:06:49:04

Zack Oates

Yeah. So thinking about that, and in terms of the people that you help in, basically, like if you were to say this is like the ideal type of restaurant that we work with, what does that look like? What problems are they having?

00:06:49:06 – 00:07:09:05

Brianne Harvey

So a lot of the groups, we have a couple different avenues that you can work with, break bread. A lot of it is new system implementation often will end up working with chef driven concepts, full service restaurants, emerging groups. So five plus locations where you start to get different layers of complexity within your systems, within your staff, within your team.

00:07:09:11 – 00:07:24:13

Brianne Harvey

But you don’t have an in-house AI team yet, or even you have an in-house I.T team, but like you don’t have the bandwidth. This is what we hear a lot. I love that, but we don’t have the time to implement it. We don’t have the time to set it up. We don’t have the time to manage it because my team is a team of restaurant people.

00:07:24:13 – 00:07:44:20

Brianne Harvey

We just kind of bolt on to your existing team, work on behalf of the restaurant in this interim capacity until you’re ready to fly on your own. It’s very different for most restaurant hire groups is that we’re just an extension of your restaurant. In the interim, we come in with expertise and we get you up and running, and my goal is we will support you as long as you possibly need it.

00:07:44:20 – 00:07:51:21

Brianne Harvey

But I want to train up your team so that they can do it on their own. Like, if I’m successful, eventually you won’t need me on this.

00:07:51:21 – 00:08:09:15

Zack Oates

Like, yeah, it’s like there’s a giant uphill climb and then it’s kind of like a very steady slope after that. So like, you need the guide to get you to the top of the plateau. But then from there it’s like, okay, we we need to maintain this. We need to keep it going until you’re ready for that next level up, in which case you need another call.

00:08:09:15 – 00:08:09:23

Zack Oates

Brian.

00:08:09:23 – 00:08:23:19

Brianne Harvey

Again, a lot of times we’ll just we’ll just jump from one project into another and help people along the way. I have clients that we worked with for four plus years now, and and I love that long term relationship and everything. But I’m always just as if you had hired me into your restaurant group. That’s what I’m thinking.

00:08:23:19 – 00:08:39:11

Brianne Harvey

As well as how can we make this, this process better? How can we make it easier? Those are the things that myself and my partner will focus on mostly is like the strategy behind things, more of the advisory work. And then we have a full team of professionals that do the hands on implementation and bring that to life.

00:08:39:13 – 00:09:00:21

Zack Oates

Yeah, that’s awesome because I think about it in terms of I remember when I was speaking of like the Sherpas, when I was trekking through the Himalayas with my wife, each had a Sherpa that would help us through. And what was interesting was these guides, again, like we would carry our stuff, but then unlike the really tough parts, they would carry it for us.

00:09:00:24 – 00:09:12:13

Zack Oates

So they were able to help us over because they were just so experienced and so good. So anyway, it was a great experience, but it’s important to have that on these tech mountains as well.

00:09:12:15 – 00:09:13:20

Brianne Harvey

Very good amount. Yeah.

00:09:13:23 – 00:09:33:16

Zack Oates

Yeah. So as you’re thinking about some tactics, I’d love to kind of shift this question a little bit of what are some things that you see restaurant brands doing that are either really helping out with the guest experience from a technology standpoint, or are there some big mistakes that some common mistakes that you see in your restaurant clients?

00:09:33:18 – 00:09:56:07

Brianne Harvey

So I think that the things that are really helping out, there’s a couple that come to mind right away is most of the groups I work with, our reservation driven, they’re really utilizing that tool, putting notes in there. So like, let’s say I come in and I sit at the bar and I always enjoy Sauvignon Blanc is putting the note in there so that if there is a new bartender that comes in, she already knows, offer me Sauvignon blanc or knows that that and that little extra touch goes a long way.

00:09:56:07 – 00:10:18:00

Brianne Harvey

So being able to utilize the tools that are already in that system to just make notes and understand, to pay attention to your guests is really helpful. I think you can do that as well as like quick server, fast casual that are leaning on these third party deliveries. DoorDash and UberEats and things like that. You can put menus or like an extra, like a little cookie or something that goes along with a thank you.

00:10:18:00 – 00:10:38:07

Brianne Harvey

I think people don’t do that. And so when your restaurant does, it goes a long way. If I’m going to order Chinese again, I’m absolutely going back to this place. You know, they they throw in some spring rolls for me to try. And there are amazing there’s little things that you can do to go the extra mile. And I think it’s leaning on those tools and those like almost like a CRM, managing the people and understanding the people and leaning into that.

00:10:38:12 – 00:10:55:06

Brianne Harvey

I have seen a lot of success in like iPhone answering systems too, which some people love and hate. But I think they’re great because after hours, if I’m calling late night, I can get some valuable information. Whereas like if I sit on the phone and it rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and oh my.

00:10:55:06 – 00:10:55:15

Zack Oates

Gosh.

00:10:55:17 – 00:10:57:01

Brianne Harvey

Yeah. So that’s great.

00:10:57:03 – 00:11:13:23

Zack Oates

That is one of the most irritating. There’s a restaurant right down the street, and I used to love going there, but I tried calling them three different times to place an order so I could pick it up when I left work. It’s that way I could just grab it and then go home. And they didn’t answer three times.

00:11:14:01 – 00:11:30:03

Zack Oates

So it was like, okay, like I’m not coming back here. And so that’s actually one of the reasons that we created ovation call to text is because if someone calls, at the very least they want to talk to someone. Great. Press the option to talk to someone. But a lot of times I don’t need to talk to someone.

00:11:30:03 – 00:11:51:01

Zack Oates

I’m just like, hey, if I want to place an order, let me do it on your website. If I want to place a catering order, give me the link to give you the information for the order. If I want to text you some questions, great. But like give them an option, not the phone. Going busy or going to a voicemail should never ever the option for a restaurant.

00:11:51:03 – 00:12:00:22

Zack Oates

Take care of your guest because they’re calling you to oh wait, here’s a secret they’re calling you to give you money, so let them pay you.

00:12:00:24 – 00:12:18:06

Brianne Harvey

Right? Absolutely. Yeah. You just lost business if you’re not answering the phone. And then it’s. People expect to get an immediate answer. Nowadays. Those are our expectations. We go to Google immediately. I could go to DoorDash. I could place my order. I’m done the whole process. I don’t expect delay anymore. Like I’m dealing with, like you say, you have four kids.

00:12:18:06 – 00:12:28:01

Brianne Harvey

I’m dealing with this with my three year old right now is like she expects to be able to like, watch Bluey at anytime she wants. And she could pick which episode. I’m like, man, back in the day, watch what’s on, right?

00:12:28:01 – 00:12:46:20

Zack Oates

You just watch what’s on and you wait through the commercials and you earn some patience. And yeah, I think those are some things that it’s really hard to teach, but it’s so critical that, you know, the fact is, teach your kids. But the fact is like, that’s just the way of the world right now from a technology standpoint.

00:12:46:20 – 00:13:05:10

Zack Oates

So while we want to teach our kids patience, it’s not our job to parent our guests. It’s our job to provide them what they paid for. And I love that we can do a little bit goes a long way. I mean, there are restaurants I know of who were there. You know, they could say that I can’t increase my prices.

00:13:05:12 – 00:13:27:02

Zack Oates

And I’m like, okay, but if you could increase your price, let’s say your average order value by $1, and you take that $1 and you reinvest it into the guest in doing things like a handwritten note on the box being like, hey, just wanted you to try for spring rolls right? Then that guest is going to be so much more loyal because you did the little things.

00:13:27:02 – 00:13:47:11

Zack Oates

And so think about that. Just raise your prices for $1 per be like your average ticket, and then take that $1 per ticket and invest it back into the guest. And that will pay dividends because as our friend will get there, always talks about it’s not about spending so much money. It’s about spending money on the right things.

00:13:47:13 – 00:13:51:13

Zack Oates

And the little things go a long way because you can’t fake the little things.

00:13:51:15 – 00:14:17:21

Brianne Harvey

Right. And a lot of that, I think, like you mentioned earlier, as well as the training and the culture of things, is like some of the stuff is free so you can make an impact without having to spend money, without having to throw in. You know, the spring rolls is training your servers and your bar staffs to be attentive and to care, and empowering them to lean into some of those things if they could do something special, praising them for those things, because I think not everybody, but most of us in the hospitality are in it because we love it.

00:14:17:21 – 00:14:35:19

Brianne Harvey

And when you have been in the industry for a long time, you do like serving people. I love, like having great guests and like I loved when they would come in, they’d be celebrating a special occasion and sitting at my table, and I get to be a part of that with them. And there’s something so unique and wonderful about the hospitality industry, and it’s that that people aspect interview.

00:14:35:19 – 00:14:52:09

Brianne Harvey

Empower your team to be able to do things and like be on the lookout for things that you can do to make their experience special. Like we have Coke products that my one guest really loves, Pepsi. So can we go to the store and get some cans of Pepsi? So next time they come in, we have their drink.

00:14:52:11 – 00:14:57:24

Zack Oates

Oh, why not actually wait, can you? Is that well? Are you allowed to do that? Actually do know.

00:14:58:01 – 00:15:16:14

Brianne Harvey

It depends on your contract with Coke. If you don’t have an exclusive contract, then why not? And that’s just that’s a great but kind of random example. I’ve actually done that with like crackers before where when we had saltine crackers to go with oysters and they were like club crackers. We have them. So go to the store and pick up some club crackers, and we would have them for this one guest.

00:15:16:14 – 00:15:22:24

Brianne Harvey

Whenever he came in, he was just like over the moon that we had club crackers for them. And like, what is a box like three bucks?

00:15:23:01 – 00:15:42:00

Zack Oates

Yeah, exactly. And that’s the thing, right? It’s like the little things matter. Those little things, it’s not going to bankrupt your company. It’s not going to make sure it’s not going to like put you out of business. But what it will do is by an incredible amount of loyalty, and that guest will come in more often. They’re going to tell more people about it.

00:15:42:03 – 00:16:04:22

Zack Oates

They’re going to be more forgiving about mistakes. All because you spent an additional $3 to have these oyster crackers that they want. Like, that’s such a great concept. And by the way, how cool is this that here’s to like tech nerds, the consultant and the software person. Like sitting here talking about these things that have nothing to do with technology.

00:16:04:24 – 00:16:22:08

Zack Oates

And the reason that I’m so passionate about it is because the data shows it works. And if you want a better restaurant, you need to have better technology. But at the end of the day, you gotta have more than the technology. You got to make sure that it’s instilled in the culture, right?

00:16:22:10 – 00:16:38:18

Brianne Harvey

Yeah, the technology is what allows you to do your job better and serve your guests better, and train your team and serve your staff better. Like that’s how I view it at least, is like it’s a tool there to help you right in your business and allow you to do the other things and free you up for your passions.

00:16:38:20 – 00:16:43:09

Zack Oates

Awesome will bring. How can people find in follow you?

00:16:43:11 – 00:16:56:05

Brianne Harvey

Mostly, LinkedIn is a good place to connect with me directly or through my website right? Right. Consulting.com I don’t really do a whole lot of other social media, but the slack. So really just LinkedIn and my website.

00:16:56:07 – 00:16:59:20

Zack Oates

Awesome. And who deserves an ovation? Who’s someone that we should be following?

00:16:59:22 – 00:17:24:00

Brianne Harvey

The first one that comes to mind for me is Jose Andres. I know he’s a big one, but he focuses so much on the food. Being a uniter of people and being a community aspect. And I know he does that a lot through his charities as well worldwide. And like he’s a big inspiration for me. I was lucky enough to work with his company on an implementation project a few years ago, and it was just like, I love how much he brings back food to just such a neutral ground for everyone.

00:17:24:02 – 00:17:31:24

Brianne Harvey

And this is like just such a connector. And I love viewing it that way as well. So he’s always one that I go back to. As for inspiration.

00:17:32:01 – 00:17:41:24

Zack Oates

Love that. So powerful. Well, Brian, for being the tech Sherpa we always wanted but didn’t know we could ask for. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and giving ovation.

00:17:42:01 – 00:17:43:19

Brianne Harvey

Thank you so much for having me.

00:17:43:21 – 00:18:06:08

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation up.com.

Kayla Dillon joins Zack Oates to explore how guest expectations are moving from hospitality to humanity. As a fractional CMO and brand consultant, she helps brands choose technology that truly fits, implement it correctly, and align ops, marketing, and tech to deliver connection at scale.

From Hospitality to Humanity (05:20)

Kayla argues that guests want to feel known. “They want connection.” Personalization is the goal, but it must feel human, not generic.

Right Tech, Right Setup (03:39)

Brands often buy what a headline brand uses, then struggle. “It might be the right technology, but if you set up the right thing the wrong way, it is still the wrong thing.”

Behavior Based Loyalty (10:15)

Points for transactions miss the mark. “Reward the behavior and the interests.” If a guest is vegan, a cheeseburger blast breaks trust. Use signals to tailor offers.

Connection Beats Perfection (07:14)

Zack shares that perfection can be forgiven when there is connection. Kayla agrees. Real relationships can handle mistakes when teams respond with empathy and clarity.

AI as a Helper, Not a Replacement (12:04)

AI can scale relevance if the inputs and instructions are right. It should guide recovery and personalization, while staff deliver the last foot of the experience.

Break the Silos to Serve the Guest (13:38)

Many brands stall because ops, marketing, and tech run separate agendas. “Connect them,” Kayla says. Align on the guest journey, then choose tech and SOPs that support it.

Dillon’s playbook is practical. Choose tools that match your maturity. Implement with care. Build loyalty that recognizes patterns and preferences. Use AI to assist, not replace, your people. Most of all, measure success by connection: the feeling a guest has that you see them and can respond in ways that matter. When teams are aligned and the setup is sound, humanity shows up in every touchpoint.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/kayladdillon/

Transcript

00:00:00:06 – 00:00:25:24

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give an Ovation, the Restaurant guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I get to chat with industry experts to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurants and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:26:01 – 00:00:43:14

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com and I am excited! This podcast is two years in the chambers and we’re finally getting to record it. Kayla Dillon for those of you who don’t know, you’re welcome. Glad to introduce to you a total rock star. For those of you that do know, you know why I’m so excited to have her on.

00:00:43:18 – 00:01:11:18

Zack Oates

She is a fractional CMO and a brand consultant. She’s had an amazing career in the hospitality industry. I’m so excited to have her on. And the reason that this podcast has been so hard to schedule isn’t just because she’s so busy, but it’s because every time we get on to record, we just start talking because she is just a joy to talk to, and all of a sudden we’ll get 20 minutes into a 30 minute meeting and we’re like, we don’t have time now for a podcast.

00:01:11:18 – 00:01:25:16

Zack Oates

And so let’s reschedule. And we’ve done this like four times. So Kayla, even though we’re 15 minutes late because we started talking again, I’m excited that we actually are hitting record here with that introduction. How are you?

00:01:25:18 – 00:01:45:19

Kayla Dillon

I am good, and I’m very excited to finally be on this podcast as well. We talk, I use a lot and it’s always a great conversation. I’ve always respected you as a person in this industry as well as just a good human being. So I’m really excited to be a part of this today. And yeah, let’s get it rocking and rolling.

00:01:45:21 – 00:01:53:17

Zack Oates

Yeah, I mean, it’s always fun to talk to you whether or not it’s recorded. Sometimes it’s better if it’s not recorded. But we are here and this time it’s recorded.

00:01:53:19 – 00:01:58:12

Kayla Dillon

So no AirPods for how to make this happen. Internet’s going in and out.

00:01:58:14 – 00:02:04:19

Zack Oates

We figured it out, Kayla. So talk to me about what do you do as a fractional CMO and brand consultant?

00:02:04:21 – 00:02:38:14

Kayla Dillon

It’s a really great question. Right now, I’m doing a lot of technology, and one of the brands that I support, I launched an app that’s not working appropriately. So it’s just a lot like being a normal CMO. Each day is a little different, keeps it exciting, but I get to support multiple brands, which I really like. And the idea of being a fractional CMO, what really excites me about it is kind of that nuance of being able to do multiple things and being able to help multiple brands, but the idea is to be that support a lot of brands.

00:02:38:16 – 00:03:01:11

Kayla Dillon

They don’t know what they don’t know. So being able to come in and help advise, to help stabilize for them to get to that next level, whether that’s helping to train the team, helping them uncover areas of opportunity for financial improvement and help them get to that next stage in their evolution, to then eventually be able to say goodbye.

00:03:01:13 – 00:03:13:16

Kayla Dillon

Having a high churn rate for me means that I’m doing my job well, because my goal is not to be there forever. My goal to set them up for success, that’s a lot about what I do, is just making sure to set up.

00:03:13:18 – 00:03:36:21

Zack Oates

So many brands that need that, because there’s a lot of stuff where it’s like, I can get people that can run it. I just don’t know what’s the best way to do this and to get it set up. And so really powerful to bring you in, to help out, to get things rolling with a marketing initiative, with the tech initiative, and especially someone who you’re so well versed in so many different things, having used a lot of different platforms and things like that.

00:03:36:21 – 00:03:39:20

Zack Oates

So anyway, it’s super amazing to see what you’re doing.

00:03:39:22 – 00:04:01:03

Kayla Dillon

It can be daunting, right, to open up your email or your LinkedIn. If you’re a CEO or a franchise owner, you’ve got ten units, 15 units, and you’ve got all of these things saying they’re the greatest and they’re the best, right? And maybe they see an email that comes through from Nation’s Restaurant News and they say, oh, Chili’s just got this really great thing.

00:04:01:03 – 00:04:28:18

Kayla Dillon

And they think, oh, I need that. Well, that may not be the right fit, right? So what ends up happening, which is bad for the brand, bad for the tech company and ultimately bad for the consumer, is that they get them wrong when maybe they just need a scooter. So they spend all this money on technology. They don’t either have the bandwidth or the knowledge or expertise to be able to execute it, to get the insights that they need, to then enhance the guest experience.

00:04:28:20 – 00:04:44:20

Kayla Dillon

So they end up getting burned by technology, burned by sales, and then they don’t innovate and grow. And so that’s where I see a lot of brands, especially legacy brands like an Eric that’s been around for 50 plus years. Again, you get these things and you think they’re going to be great. You got to get franchisee buy in.

00:04:44:20 – 00:04:58:00

Kayla Dillon

Sometimes you just get used to the technology. And so you’re like, oh, it’s going to be too much of a lift community to tear all these things apart. And you just need someone who’s been there to help kind of guide and direct on what’s the best next step.

00:04:58:02 – 00:05:20:14

Zack Oates

It might be the right technology, but if you set up the right thing in the wrong way, it’s still the wrong thing. But setting up the right thing in the right way and having gone through the lessons and you don’t have to learn them, wow. That’s powerful. So all of this is really talking about the guest experience. And so I’d love for you to dive into what do you think are the most important aspects of guest experience?

00:05:20:16 – 00:05:40:08

Kayla Dillon

Well, I think it’s changed. We talked about this a little bit prior to this, but it’s a change, right? I think hospitality, the way that we’ve looked at it was, you know, good food, the drink, good time, good service. But really what people are looking for is the humanity of a brand. You know, they’re they’re looking for a connection.

00:05:40:08 – 00:06:02:17

Kayla Dillon

Right. That’s why people say, I want to be able to have that personalization when it comes to like, marketing and how a brand communicates to me. And that’s really hard to do at scale, really hard to do. But that reason is because the guest wants to feel like you know them. You look at loyalty programs, and I think loyalty programs in general need a full overhaul.

00:06:02:19 – 00:06:25:12

Kayla Dillon

But the whole idea of it is so that you can know your guest and you can talk to them about the things that mattered to them. And a lot of times, loyalty programs become just a one size fits all, where I, for example, maybe I’m a vegan and if you send me an email about a cheeseburger, that’s not going to make me feel like you know me or that we have a connection, right?

00:06:25:12 – 00:06:43:15

Kayla Dillon

And it is pivotal today to get as many touch points as you can to connect with that consumer and finding them kind of wherever they are, and making sure that you’re responding again with that empathy, that knowledge, and making them feel special and important. I mean, don’t you like feeling special and important?

00:06:43:17 – 00:07:14:05

Zack Oates

A man, right. And I think one of the things that we talk about beforehand is that the guest expectation is perfection. But the beautiful thing is that from the restaurant’s perspective, it’s not about perfection, it’s about connection. And we strive for perfection. But perfection can be forgiven if we fall short. If there is connection. And the same mistake that I meet someone for the first time, what if I say something rude?

00:07:14:07 – 00:07:33:06

Zack Oates

They’re going to be like, I don’t like that. Now if I have a friend who we’ve hung out two dozen times and I say the same exact thing, they may think either that’s silly that he made that comment like, I know that’s not what he actually thinks. Or they may say, Zach, you know, I just want to let you know, like, that hurt my feelings when you said that.

00:07:33:08 – 00:07:55:08

Zack Oates

And then I can apologize. But we’ve built that connection over two dozen times. And now what happens to our relationship when I say yes? You’re right. That was a dumb thing for me to say. I’m sorry I said that. Kayla, let me be better. Can you help me be better? Then all of a sudden, our friendship that goes from now we’re friends two dozen times for a visit and two dozen times hanging out.

00:07:55:10 – 00:08:12:10

Zack Oates

And that, like, accelerates it to like, 100 times because we’ve built that connection. And that’s what people want. Because no one is perfect. And everyone hates the people that are perfect. They always look for the one thing that they can like. No, they’re not perfect. See, I got them.

00:08:12:12 – 00:08:33:18

Kayla Dillon

Completely and it just strengthens the bond, right? I mean, I think sometimes we just get so in our own heads when it comes to business. Right? Just in general and especially I think when you’re looking at a hospitality like customer first business, we get so in the weeds. And so complicated where it’s like, think about you as a human.

00:08:33:20 – 00:08:53:08

Kayla Dillon

If this was a relationship, which is what it should be, you have a relationship with the customer, with the guest. Think about your own personal relationship. What matters to you when someone like Zach, thank you for apologizing, by the way, I appreciate that really hurt my feelings. Now we can be stronger together. We should think about, you know, something like that.

00:08:53:10 – 00:09:13:05

Kayla Dillon

And like what? That would make me feel versus, yeah, I’m getting kind of a spray and pray approach of like, oh, I’ll do a LinkedIn thing saying, hey, sometimes you say things that hurt people’s feelings and, well, I’m sorry if I’ve ever done that to you. That’s not going to make me feel good, is not gonna make me feel like you understood that what you said hurt my feelings.

00:09:13:07 – 00:09:33:19

Kayla Dillon

It’s just people being people. And sometimes people be people in in a bad way, and they’re annoying. And things don’t go well on both sides. But if you think about it from that perspective, I think the industry as a whole would grow and it would be more better because we need to move from this hospitality to humanity. Like, I think that’s key.

00:09:33:21 – 00:09:48:11

Zack Oates

A man, I love that, and in doing so, like I get that theory, but what are some tactics that you’ve seen that actually allow restaurants to improve the guest experience and to implement that humanity?

00:09:48:13 – 00:10:15:21

Kayla Dillon

I think a big part of that, I think it’s evolving, right. Especially when you look at I think it’s making it a lot easier to do a lot of these things. But it’s changing for like rewards. Great example. Instead of just rewarding based on transaction, look at behavior, look at interests. Look at those things that you’re doing every day as a consumer and reward that.

00:10:15:21 – 00:10:48:01

Kayla Dillon

Reward the frequency or the surprise and delight. Right? Like not just give options. That is how you’re going to move the needle, not just sending, hey, here’s $10 because you spend give 100 points. Here’s to a $10 reward. That is not the way of the future. And if you as a brand or even as a technology company, if you’re not already thinking about how do we connect based on behaviors and interests, you’re going to be left behind, because I’m telling you, that’s what the consumer wants.

00:10:48:03 – 00:11:08:07

Kayla Dillon

Even looking at again with AI last night, I needed to make dinner and I could not find I was searching through Pinterest, could not find my recipe. I was ChatGPT and said, hey, I’m looking and put in, these are my ingredients. This is what I’m looking for and it gave me probably the best meal. Me. My husband had like two servings of it.

00:11:08:07 – 00:11:12:18

Kayla Dillon

I had two servings of it. I mean, it was really good. I had an interest.

00:11:12:18 – 00:11:13:20

Zack Oates

And what was.

00:11:13:20 – 00:11:24:09

Kayla Dillon

It was a oh, I’ll send it to you. It was turkey meatloaf, cheddar ranch mashed potatoes and green beans that had all kinds of seasoning on them.

00:11:24:12 – 00:11:34:14

Zack Oates

It was it. You are a marketing powerhouse and you have time to cook a three course meal. Oh my gosh. And your great mom like this is too much, Kayla. Too much.

00:11:34:19 – 00:11:42:12

Kayla Dillon

Thank you. You’re making me blush over here. But we’ll say that survey to the kids and the husband. See, he had a smiley face or.

00:11:42:14 – 00:12:04:14

Zack Oates

Yeah, right. But but truly the like, that’s where technology is. And I just was able to show you some of the back end of ovation and see like how much I is able to help drive that connection. Now, what it comes down to though, is giving it the right instructions and having the right inputs of data. So it’s most accurate.

00:12:04:14 – 00:12:26:17

Zack Oates

If you just said, give me a mashed potato and turkey meatloaf and green bean recipe, it wouldn’t have done that. And that’s part of the power that we’ve seen of ovation is leveraging. We have saved over 1 million guests. 1 million people had a bad experience at a restaurant. They were recovered with ovation, and they verifiably came back into that restaurant and spent money.

00:12:26:19 – 00:12:49:24

Zack Oates

The reason I bring that up is because it’s so key that we learn from that context. What were the things that brought them back in? And that’s part of what we leverage to help brands recover these guests. And it needs to feel personal, and it is personal, but just because I is helping doesn’t mean that your staff is off the hook, right?

00:12:50:01 – 00:13:09:24

Zack Oates

You still need that not last mile delivery, but last foot delivery. That’s what is going to be the final cherry on top of all the other things that went into that guest experience and all the technology and everything else, it still comes down to humanity, not just of the guest, but of the people.

00:13:10:01 – 00:13:38:01

Kayla Dillon

Well, and even talking through this idea of like connection, right? When you look at it from an organizational standpoint, operations, marketing and technology, they need to connect to give the customer the best experience. And I see so many times I’ve been in those rooms where everyone’s siloed, right? Everyone has their own initiative, everyone has their own favorite priority or their own point of view.

00:13:38:07 – 00:14:07:21

Kayla Dillon

What it ends up doing is fracturing, right? The organization and never letting it move to that next level because they’re stuck and they’ve got to connect, right? Whether that is, again, a specific type of technology or an SOP or an LTO, and being able to leverage that internal organizational connection to then connect better and more efficiently with that guest, that’s what should happen.

00:14:07:23 – 00:14:16:06

Kayla Dillon

But today it’s still very much fractured, siloed, inefficient. And that’s a big challenge that needs to be solved.

00:14:16:08 – 00:14:25:21

Zack Oates

And that’s why I’m so glad that you’re out there helping restaurants do this. So who deserves an ovation in the restaurant industry? Who’s someone that we should be following?

00:14:25:23 – 00:14:28:18

Kayla Dillon

Oh gosh, that maybe people aren’t already following.

00:14:28:20 – 00:14:32:21

Zack Oates

Or maybe they are. Who do you turn to that you think is doing some great stuff?

00:14:32:23 – 00:14:54:18

Kayla Dillon

Well, oh god, there’s so many. I really enjoy what Chris Munns posts. I think he’s very insightful. I’ve worked with Chris and work with him now, so that’s not a plug to him. But by genuinely the part of the reason is because we connected on LinkedIn. I enjoyed his content and he enjoyed mine, and we started to work together because of it.

00:14:54:20 – 00:15:22:24

Kayla Dillon

He brings a really unique perspective, but if I were to actually give advice on like who? I think we especially as leaders in this industry should follow, we should follow the ones that are the up and coming right, the ones that need our support or mentorship because we know whether it’s LinkedIn or any type of social or reviews.

00:15:22:24 – 00:15:37:11

Kayla Dillon

Right? It’s all about volume. Like the more followers you have. And those are the things that help move you into an algorithm and help you connect with more people. So I would say like start looking for some of those up and comers. Let’s support them.

00:15:37:13 – 00:15:49:00

Zack Oates

Love that. And first of all, Chris Munns. Love him. He’s just such a great human as well as really, really sharp in the industry. And Caleb, where can people go to find and follow you?

00:15:49:02 – 00:16:23:21

Kayla Dillon

Well, LinkedIn’s the best place to find me, although I’m not as active recently because I’ve been really busy trying to start my own company. But there will be a website coming soon be called Go torch.com, so go to TED.com and that is where you’ll be able to find the variety of services that we use to help brands, both on the technology side and on the restaurant brand side, to take those fractured silos, burn them down and help build that bridge connection.

00:16:23:23 – 00:16:35:18

Zack Oates

Awesome. Love that so much. And Caleb, for reminding us that from family to friends to food, it’s all about connection. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and giving ovation.

00:16:35:20 – 00:16:37:05

Kayla Dillon

Thank you.

00:16:37:07 – 00:16:59:20

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation up.com.

Geoffrey Toffetti, CEO of Frontline Performance Group, joins Zack Oates to explore why the guest experience can never exceed the employee experience. Frontline Performance Group helps brands strengthen their teams through recognition, accountability, and training that translate directly into revenue and loyalty.

Frontline Culture Sets the Brand (01:15)

The frontline defines the brand. “You can expect your guests to be treated exactly the way you treat those who lead.” Culture begins at the top and flows to every guest interaction.

From Selling to Serving (04:06)

Language changes outcomes. Geoffrey teaches staff to recommend, not ask. “Most people who order this steak really enjoy our asparagus.” Guests feel served, not sold, and revenue grows naturally.

Reward, Recognition, Accountability (05:40)

Geoffrey’s career performance equation balances incentives, praise, and clear expectations. “It’s not all fluff. You need a little carrot and a little stick.” Recognition matters as much as results.

Measure What You Coach (08:02)

Clear metrics and visibility drive growth. “When you think you’re doing well and see you’re ninth out of twelve, it’s eye-opening.” Leaderboards give accountability without confrontation.

Top Performers Do It Differently (10:31)

Even on the same shift, top servers generate up to 25 percent more revenue per guest. The difference comes from attentiveness, tone, and timely follow-up.

Lead With Trust and Respect (15:18)

The best leaders model the behavior they expect. “Give your team love, trust, and respect first. They’ll pass it to your guests.” Recognition rituals and peer-to-peer shout-outs reinforce that culture.

Hospitality starts with people, not policies. Define standards, celebrate wins, and build a culture where the frontline feels supported and seen. When employees thrive, guests notice—and everyone wins.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/gtoffetti/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/frontline-performance-group/about/

https://www.instagram.com/frontlineperformancegroup/

https://frontlinepg.com/

Transcript

00:00:00:07 – 00:00:25:12

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give an Ovation, the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oates, and each week I chat with industry experts to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurant and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:25:14 – 00:00:49:15

Zack Oates

Learn more at ovation up.com. And today we have Geoffrey Toffetti with us. He is the CEO of Front Line Performance Group. He’s been there for 14 years working with some amazing brands. He is lucky to be based in Florida, especially on this chilly winter day in Utah. But Joffrey, so excited to have you on the podcast. Thanks for joining us.

00:00:49:17 – 00:00:52:22

Geoffrey Toffetti

Thank you Zach, I’m really excited about doing this, I appreciate it.

00:00:52:24 – 00:01:15:10

Zack Oates

And one of the things I was drawn to when I was doing some research on you was just one of the things that we always say here on the podcast is that the guest experience cannot exceed the employee experience. And so for those who don’t know, maybe you can share a little bit about what does Front Line Performance Group do and how do you help to create a better customer experience?

00:01:15:12 – 00:01:41:02

Geoffrey Toffetti

Yeah. So Frontline Performance Group has been around for we’re in our 33rd year and we’ve always exclusively supported frontline teams in a variety of industries, anything from car dealerships to theme parks. And now hospitality. Hospitality has become our strategic focus. Hotels and restaurants and bars. And the way that we help create a great guest experience is that we are we’re in the business of improving and developing the front line.

00:01:41:08 – 00:02:10:08

Geoffrey Toffetti

So the front line is the brand. A lot of business owners or corporate leaders forget that your entire brand experience is your frontline employees. They can make or break any experience that a guest is going to have. So if you refine the front lines, approach, if you empower them, if you build a really strong culture around them, it’s going to translate directly to your guests because the phrase you just used our version is you can expect your guests to be treated exactly the way you treat those who lead.

00:02:10:08 – 00:02:11:04

Zack Oates

Bam!

00:02:11:06 – 00:02:29:20

Geoffrey Toffetti

Culture rolls downhill, right? And so that’s our entire ethos is how do we get the culture sound? How do we get people trained up to be effective in their jobs? And then everyone wins. The frontline can make more money, the restaurant or hotel can thrive, and the guest has a better experience because the human exchange is more nuanced.

00:02:29:22 – 00:02:55:05

Zack Oates

I think that is so powerful to think about because you do all of this work. I mean, everything that we do in hospitality is either to increase profits or create a better guest experience everything. And yet, when you look at the power of your frontline workers, we recently had a podcast episode with the CEO of Taco Deli, where he was talking about some of his employees have been there for over 20 years, these kitchen managers.

00:02:55:05 – 00:03:23:07

Zack Oates

And so you want to talk about profitability, how quickly and efficiently and without mistakes can someone that’s been there for 20 years doing it, as opposed to someone that’s been there for 20 hours, right. There’s a profitability with your people. And not only that, everything that happens, the last line is always the front line, which is like we often talk about the last mile, but it’s about that last foot when I hand it to you, how do you feel when I put the food down?

00:03:23:07 – 00:03:44:21

Zack Oates

How did you feel when I’m exposing for a to go order? How accurate is it? And it’s all about those front line people. So what do you actually do to help frontline workers like. And maybe we could kind of parlay that into talking about the guest experience. But how do you think about the important aspects of guest experience as it relates to frontline workers?

00:03:44:23 – 00:04:06:15

Geoffrey Toffetti

We spend our time in environments where revenue is in play, so we use revenue as the benchmark for the performance of our of our model. So how do we help as we go in. And the other software platform. And it basically provides the entire toolkit to optimize performance at the frontline. It handles recognition. It handles goal setting, incentive calculations and training.

00:04:06:15 – 00:04:27:22

Geoffrey Toffetti

There’s a lot of training in there. But essentially what we’re trying to do is we’re trying to get the front line to engage the guest in a service focused way, to drive more revenue by listening to them, by responding to the cues you’re receiving, and by basically fulfilling your promise. So being attentive, being aware of what’s going on, active listening.

00:04:28:01 – 00:04:49:12

Geoffrey Toffetti

But we also teach them the right way to promote things. So you don’t ask, do you want this or do you want that you recommend? I’ll give you a real example. Let’s say someone orders a steak and you want to sell them an add on to that steak. You wouldn’t say, do you want asparagus with that? You’d say, you know, most people that have this steak really enjoy our asparagus.

00:04:49:14 – 00:05:09:06

Geoffrey Toffetti

That is a nuanced way of promoting. And same with the hotel. If someone’s checking in and you want to offer them a room, you don’t just say, do you want a bigger room? You say, because you’re traveling with your family and you need a little more space. I think you’d enjoy a suite. It’s a nuance, but it changes the dynamic of being sold to to being served.

00:05:09:08 – 00:05:14:09

Geoffrey Toffetti

And when you can actually accomplish that, your revenue goes up and your guest experience goes up.

00:05:14:14 – 00:05:40:22

Zack Oates

Amen. And I think that when you think about what does that look like in terms of the guest experience and when you can say, hey, I want to make sure that the guest is feeling something I love that is really thinking about it in terms of how do we train, how do we improve the employees, and what are some tactics that you’ve seen that have actually helped employees feel empowered and feel like they matter?

00:05:40:24 – 00:06:03:14

Geoffrey Toffetti

We promote what we call the career performance equation. Our founders, the Corey who was the visionary of this and it’s basically a framework for leadership and culture. There’s three things that are necessary to properly motivate frontline people. One is reward. So they have to be getting rewarded in some way incentives and tips. And in restaurants it could be incentive program recognition.

00:06:03:16 – 00:06:23:10

Geoffrey Toffetti

So when people are doing what you want them to do, recognize them publicly in front of their peers and accountability. So it’s not all fluff. You need a little carrot, little stick. So accountability is are you fulfilling your part of the mission as an employee? Whatever the standards are that we set as a business, and when you put those three things.

00:06:23:10 – 00:06:45:00

Zack Oates

Together, by the way, can we just whatever the standards you set as a business, that is important because what I see a lot of times is people will come in, the standards are not explicitly set. And then it’s like, hey, we want you to we just had someone who was head of brand at Papa John’s, and we were talking about how she’s like, we want them to be friendly.

00:06:45:06 – 00:06:53:03

Zack Oates

Well, what is friendly mean and like, maybe I’m from New York. Friendly, mean something very different than if I’m from Utah.

00:06:53:05 – 00:06:55:14

Geoffrey Toffetti

Yeah, if you’re from Philly, it might mean insulting your guest.

00:06:55:20 – 00:07:00:08

Zack Oates

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Right. There we are. You from North Jersey?

00:07:00:10 – 00:07:03:22

Geoffrey Toffetti

No. Oh, God, I know. Well, I know, I know the area.

00:07:03:24 – 00:07:26:01

Zack Oates

Yeah, but I mean, that’s the thing, right? You got to clearly set the expectations of what you want them to be doing. But anyway, sorry I cut you off there. But just like that. So key to not forget that it is our job as leaders to set the expectations so that we can hold them accountable so that they know what it means to be successful, right?

00:07:26:03 – 00:07:43:00

Geoffrey Toffetti

That’s exactly right. So the best way to set an expectation in a service focus, where your product is service, is to embody it. That’s the best way for a leader to get a standard set is to be the standard. And then you can say with a straight face, I expect you to treat the guests the way I’m treating you.

00:07:43:02 – 00:08:02:19

Geoffrey Toffetti

But yeah, defining it, having a framework, having a process that you endorse as a business leader that you want people to follow, all those things are important, that you can hold people accountable, but it’s also measurement. So you can’t hold someone accountable if you’re not measuring their performance. So we our platform is really all about how are people doing?

00:08:02:21 – 00:08:30:08

Geoffrey Toffetti

Are they responding positively to the training? Do we see their metrics improving? And we’re big believers in leaderboards. So you put their names don’t have to be on there like in our system that the the servers have their own app, but they only see their name on the leaderboard, but they can see where they rank. So when you think you’re doing a good job and you look at the leaderboard and your nine out of 12 positions, it’s eye opening and that’s the accountability that we go for, is just let them know where they are.

00:08:30:10 – 00:08:46:24

Geoffrey Toffetti

You don’t have to confront them with it, but just let them know where they are and then make the training and make the recognition and make the reward programs available to drive their performance up. But it’s your point. If you don’t know what you’re striving for, you’re on quicksand. You don’t know what the goalposts are. You got to set some goalposts.

00:08:46:24 – 00:08:48:16

Geoffrey Toffetti

What is success?

00:08:48:18 – 00:09:22:09

Zack Oates

And are we providing them with the training and tools to be successful? And I think that’s something where I’m thinking that this episode is reminding me of, like the cliff notes of The Five Dysfunctions of a team, you know, because it really is. I mean, there’s so much there that that is so good and accurate, but we get so caught up sometimes in strategy or in maybe our pet project of what we care about the most, that we forget the really, it’s about making sure that our team is empowered to be successful.

00:09:22:11 – 00:09:47:24

Geoffrey Toffetti

Yeah, a common thought experiment would be if you had a really beautiful esthetic restaurant. The menu was amazing, the chef was a superstar and your staff were rude. Would the food and esthetic prevail? And conversely, if you have a dive bar on the beach selling fried food, but your staff is incredibly good, would that overcome the esthetic? And I think everyone knows the intuitive answer.

00:09:48:01 – 00:10:08:24

Geoffrey Toffetti

The staff set the quality of the experience. It’s not the environment. I mean, those are all important things. I understand you want to go for a concept, but if you don’t have the right culture at the front line, you lose. And most restaurants are pre they’re okay. I mean, you go in, people are rude. You know, they’re not yelling at you and stuff, but they’re just not as tuned in as they could be.

00:10:09:01 – 00:10:31:16

Geoffrey Toffetti

For instance, we work with a bunch of restaurants and we look at the leaderboards on revenue per guest. This is just as an example. And in the same shift, the same servers, there is often a 20 to 25% differential in revenue per guest between the top performers and the bottom. That means same guest, same shift. You could make 20% more revenue.

00:10:31:18 – 00:10:50:10

Geoffrey Toffetti

Why? Because the people at the top are engaging the guests. They’re super friendly. They’re listening. They’re seizing opportunities to recommend enhancements where others are just taking the order and they’re like, oh my, you know, my name is dropping to take care. I’d say, would you like some bread? That’s what’s happening. The top performers are like, let’s get you started with a round of drinks.

00:10:50:10 – 00:11:11:13

Geoffrey Toffetti

Let’s get this experience underway. I’ll be right back. They come back when they say they’re going to. They don’t leave for 20 minutes so you can’t get your drink refilled. It’s like those kind of things. So that’s what we’re focused on, is the techniques that separate top performance from average and imparting that into the servers by giving it a what’s in it for me, which is the accountability, reward and recognition.

00:11:11:19 – 00:11:40:19

Zack Oates

Love that. And at the end of the day, people want to feel seen and they want money, right. And so if we can find a way to give them both, then Amen. Love that. And one of the things that I’d love to get your professional opinion on this, one of the things that we do at ovation is we do something called Given Ovation, where it’s not just the podcast, but we also have an internal giving ovation where everyone at ovation gets what they call an ovation that they get to give to somebody else.

00:11:40:19 – 00:11:58:01

Zack Oates

So it’s a monthly bonus that they have to give to someone else. And then and are all hands meetings. They fill out a form beforehand saying who they are giving their ovation to because they exhibited which of our five ovation values and what happened that made them earn that ovation of yours. And then we read that in the all hands meeting.

00:11:58:01 – 00:12:15:09

Zack Oates

And so that’s just a small way that we can catch everyone. Everyone’s looking for other ways to say thank you and to find people that are doing good out there, I guess. What do you think about that? And what are some simple ways that other that restaurants might be able to help in the recognition standpoint?

00:12:15:11 – 00:12:32:22

Geoffrey Toffetti

Yeah. So I think that’s a phenomenal scenario. We do something internally. We call it cheers for peers similar concept. We do it every Friday and it’s anyone in the company can give cheers to anyone else in the company. And it’s sent out to the whole company. So it’s you do exactly what you’re saying with an ovation. I love that you coined that.

00:12:32:24 – 00:13:02:07

Geoffrey Toffetti

I think that for the average business owner, I think it’s about having the kind of environment where you solicit from them. Positive feedback. I’m thinking about my son. He was on a football team, one of the top teams in the country for a while, and at the end of practice, they make a starter stand up and pick a nonstarter and in front of the entire team, recognize them for something so that he’s bringing the people who aren’t on the field into the fold with the starters.

00:13:02:07 – 00:13:26:15

Geoffrey Toffetti

And it culturally, it’s a massive when you’re the kid. When my kid was a freshman and one of the seniors called his name, it’s like you make your month, a similar kind of thing could happen your senior season. People could pick your people that haven’t been there as long, like you were saying, with the value of a cook that’s been doing the line for 20 years versus a newbie, but have them recognize each other, is a hugely powerful for culture building, there’s no question.

00:13:26:15 – 00:13:42:04

Zack Oates

I love that. Amazing. And I love this conversation because it really is all about the people and just fantastic. So if someone is, you obviously know a lot of people around this industry who is someone that we should be following who deserves an ovation?

00:13:42:06 – 00:13:58:14

Geoffrey Toffetti

Well, I’ll tell you, there’s several people I work with that I would love to answer that question with, but I can’t because then I’m excluding everyone else. And I have to be very careful. But will guidara the book you have on the shelf behind you, hugely influential to our thinking about food and beverage. This is our newest industry.

00:13:58:14 – 00:14:24:15

Geoffrey Toffetti

We’ve been working at it for about two years, but we work with almost 3000 hotels. But the restaurants is fairly new for us. He has been a huge influence on understanding the psyche of a restaurant tour, and how you can go over the top to win guest favor. Now, not everyone can afford to do what 11 Madison does, but the minor nuances that you can impart onto your staff by treating them in a nuanced way, you’re basically teaching them.

00:14:24:15 – 00:14:32:20

Geoffrey Toffetti

And every interaction they have with you on how to treat the guest. And that will definitely drive for. And he has been hugely influential to us.

00:14:32:22 – 00:14:53:07

Zack Oates

Yeah, there’s a reason the book is right behind me. He’s one of my heroes. He’s been an incredible guy. And they say, don’t meet your heroes. And I had him on the podcast and I think that phrase is accurate, not because I was at all disappointed because he was every ounce as amazing as I thought he was, but because I got so scared to meet him, because I just was such a fanboy.

00:14:53:07 – 00:15:13:16

Zack Oates

So don’t meet your heroes because you may look like an idiot. But anyway. But truly though, just what a great guy and totally influential. I have my two shoulder angels or will guidara and just love. And I think that’s what it’s all about. Any last advice to someone who is thinking about how do I improve the performance of my frontline staff?

00:15:13:18 – 00:15:18:00

Zack Oates

Anything that, besides reaching out to you, which we’re going to get to in just a second.

00:15:18:02 – 00:15:36:22

Geoffrey Toffetti

You just stole my punchline. I was going to say, other than hiring us. Yeah. I mean, I’ve never owned or run a restaurant, so there’s things about it I’m not going to presume to know. But what I do know is, is frontline team culture and selling. And I’ve said it a couple times, it’s really like you have to impart love and trust and respect to your team.

00:15:36:24 – 00:15:58:08

Geoffrey Toffetti

You as a leader have to do that first. You can’t expect them to give it to you first. You’ve got to give it to them first. And when you give them trust and love and respect, they are going to pass that right on to the guest. If you’re treating them like an authoritarian and you’re micromanaging them and you’re bossing them around, you can expect they’re going to be short with your guests.

00:15:58:08 – 00:16:17:13

Geoffrey Toffetti

They’re not going to have patience because they don’t feel like there’s room for them to take their time and do it right, so they’re going to rush the guests. It is how it is. But a lot of times you get wrapped up, you lose sight of the fact that that’s what you’re doing. So I would say, look in the mirror, ask, am I treating my guests, my employees, the way that I want them to treat the guests?

00:16:17:13 – 00:16:21:12

Geoffrey Toffetti

And if the answer is no, just make adjustments. It’s never too late to make the adjustments.

00:16:21:14 – 00:16:34:23

Zack Oates

I love that. Awesome. Well, Joffrey, for reminding us that team is key and for being the kindest Joffrey out of the two that I know of. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and giving ovation.

00:16:35:00 – 00:16:37:11

Geoffrey Toffetti

Thank you so much. It was great to be here.

00:16:37:13 – 00:17:00:00

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation ABC.com.