July 29, 2021 • 41 mins
On managing in a crisis and being authentic.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
So we all come with our different values and thoughts
and behaviors. Right now, in an organization, what you do
is that you essentially identify that common ground of values.
And these values, by the way, and nothing mystical. I mean,
these are very you know, values that we all have
grown up with and we know to be true. But
(00:22):
because of our life's experiences and what's important to us,
we may have different levels of hierarchy of importance of
these values. But values drive your thoughts and that therefore behavior.
If you have predictability of behavior, that's how you build
trust in a group setting. Right. I want to talk
(00:54):
about the term cheater brand that I brought into the
reality television vernacular, like into this sort of pop culture
vernacular because years ago Sonja, who I really like it
is sweet and root for uh, launched a wine brand
named Tipsy Girl, which I referred to on the show
(01:16):
as a cheater brand because I was upset that she
was launching a rose in a very copycat like name
to skinny Girl, and I was aggressive. And people love
Sonya and she's totally the you know, underdog, and I
understand why people were upset with the delivery of that um.
(01:37):
But I referred to that as a cheater brand. So
recently I posted that I'm launching a line of a clients.
Is one is this sort of like air fryar oven,
So I guess it's like a larger toaster of it
and it make can make pizza and all these different things.
And I'm launching a bunch of appliances. I'm in about
thirty categories. Newer ones are coffee syrups and cherry juice
and swim and a bunch of different things. So I
(02:02):
just in a Instant Graham story was making something and
I mentioned that I was going to launch this, and
people were like cheater brand because Sonja, I guess, had
the idea to do a toaster of a mine, but
she never launched the toaster ovens like it was a
traditional toaster of it. And I love that idea because
cooking in a toaster of it is a great idea. Um.
And so I'm going to launch a line of appliances
(02:24):
with the name Skinny Girl. The brand is Skinny Girl.
So when I called it, when I called Tipsy Girl
a cheater brand, it was because of the name Tipsy Girl.
It wasn't because she was going into wine, like someone
else launching sneakers is not a cheater brand. Someone calling
a brand swoosh with a logo that's similar to the
(02:46):
Nike logo, which couldnt happen because they'd sue you your
ass off. That would be a cheater brand. So after
my Skinny Girl came out, Applebee's came out with a
skinny be margharita, and everywhere there was a skinny margharita,
and that's because I'm b And then skinny pizza and
skinny latte is and all that came after the skinny
brawl Margharita. That's a cheater brand. If a brand is
(03:08):
like a gimmick and knocked off a little bit, then
that's a cheater brand. And interestingly enough, I'm doing a
cheater brand of my own brand because I don't own
Skinny Girl in alcohol or cocktails or intent to use
with alcohol or cocktails, So meaning I can't do a
(03:29):
line of cocktail mixers under the brand Skinny Girl because
I've sold that years ago. Only the cocktail portion I
percent of my brand. Otherwise, so I'm launching a brand
called Thirsty Girl, which is cocktail mixers. So it's like
a gimmick where I'm copying myself. So I'm creating a
cheater brand of myself. But the idea of going into
(03:51):
mixers is not a cheater brand a low calorie cocktail
because I created that category. Meaning before this any girl margarita,
there was never It was the first ever low calorie
ready to drink a cocktail. So someone else coming up
with a low calorie cocktail is it's more of like
(04:12):
a cheater category because it would depend upon the name
of the brand. But anyone doing that, that's that's copying
the idea. That's not even technically the Cheetah brand. It's
a cheater product, which is not a real term. But anyway,
so if I'm doing an air fryer of an appliance
and Sonya who never launched one, but even if she
(04:33):
had launched one, this would be a cheater product. A
bunch of people launched cocktails after and as a result
of my skinny Girl deal. Uh So that's just a
little lesson about what a cheater brand is and isn't.
So what cheater brands have you seen? And you get
the difference between the cheater brand and the cheater product,
(04:54):
But it's really funny, people like, look at you launching
a toaster. Cheater brand was sowing you, and I'm like, well,
Sonia and launch a toaster. But a toaster is an
item that is very common in people's homes. And I'm
not launching a toaster. I'm launching an elevated, uh convenient
oven um. But I appreciated people's protection and fervor for
this topic. And to use a word and like a
(05:17):
terminology back to me that I introduced into the vernacular.
But you should sort of understand what something is before
you talk about it. My guest today is now Written Chattery,
who was named CEO of Panera Bread in May of
(05:38):
two thousand nineteen, right before a very crazy roller coaster
time in our country and our world. Marion has more
than twenty five years of international corporate leadership experience in
the food, retail and hospitality industry. He joined Panera from
Crispy Kreme, where he served as CELLO and President of
the International division, and before then, he spent twenty three
(06:01):
years at Young Brands in a number of different positions,
including serving as a President of Young India and most
recently in the role of President of KFC Global. So
He's got a lot of experience in the food industry,
big companies, big trends, big business. And we talked today
about why you need to inspire your team in order
to succeed, the importance of staying calm during a crisis,
(06:26):
looking out for your team. Hey, you can use calamity
as an opportunity to improve your business, and why you
need to lead by example. He is an incredibly successful
business leader, and I think you're really going to learn
a lot from his interview. I definitely did. I was
shocked and surprised by some of the information that I
got today. It will be amazing for business people. So
(06:46):
I thought it was a great conversation. I'm interested to
hear what you think. UH do remember to rate, review
and subscribe. I appreciate it so much. Thank you there
so um. The first question I have is have you
(07:07):
always been a corporate more structured person, meaning do you
have that individual entrepreneurial spirit or you've always felt more
comfortable sort of working in a team pack hierarchy mentality,
because I know you were a Crispy Cream before and
Young Brands, which is a major, UH public company, So
(07:29):
that's a serious These are serious places that you're working,
and I wonder if you've ever been out on your own. No,
I've always um had a corporate career, um, but I
think always had the mindset of being myself wherever I
was at, and you know, being authentically who I am.
(07:52):
So I've never felt that I had to pretend to
be anybody I'm not. So I would say that even
if I was on my own and doing my own thing,
I would pretty much lead the way that I lead
with at least companies, because there's a convergence of you know,
values and beliefs and what's important. So you're able to
(08:15):
experience individualism within the corporate structure because a lot of
people listening, you know, we talked to a lot of
people here that are mavericks and brand builders in a
non traditional sets. But then many people listening work within
a corporate structure, uh, something more professional or you do
have to play the game, work within a group. It's
(08:36):
not for everybody. Some people must be in a group mentality,
they need that support. Some people must be individual you know.
For me, I don't know how I would be working
within the corporate landscape. I think I'd be living in
fear of the time. So for the people who do
work within some sort of a structure and corporate landscape,
I want to talk to them about how they can
(08:58):
be individual and still be entrepreneurs and get to the top,
you know, and still be Maverick game changers. Yeah, so
I think, you know, how can you bring your own
game in the most authentic way every single day at
your place of work is a very liberating place to
(09:20):
be in. And I think that can happen only if
you are fortunate to work in a company that mirrors
and reflects the values that you believe in, and it
has a culture that allows you to be that, you know.
So I think that at Young Brands, at Krispy Kream,
at Panera UM, and whether I was you know, growing
(09:41):
up in the organization or you know, I was leading
the company, I've always felt that this business culture of
that respects individuality and people turning up as their authentic selves,
which helps them unleash their true potential. So I think
you have to to be to do that. You have
to find a company that allows you to do that
(10:03):
and allows you to be you. And I do believe
you know that, UM. Part of my role now at
an Era for example is to make sure I'm creating
a culture of trust. By that, I mean having a
clear set of behaviors and values that defines how we
(10:23):
want to show up, how we want to you know,
how we want to treat each other, how we want
to behave And if you have clarity on those values,
then you can use that as a filter in the
people that you hire, the people that you grow, the
people that you exit, so that avert a period of time,
the people who within the organization all believe in the
(10:43):
same common ways of of behaving, so that now you're
speaking my language. Where um, that's about branding. That's about
every single person knowing what the culture of the companies
and or they may not on the first day, they
may sense of it, but that you running the show
there and driving the ship, you know exactly what the
(11:06):
culture is. And every person you hire, and every ad
campaign and every new program you implement has to adhere
to that line. And that's where the twain meet in
my opinion, because whether you're a corporate employee or an
individual entrepreneur, you need to understand what the brand of
what you're doing is and you have to adhere to that.
(11:27):
Sometimes you change you adjust the brand proposition in a pandemic,
you absolutely have to, but that all lines adhere to that.
So we talk about that a lot. So that was
interesting that you sort of mention that. Let me, let
me just react to that. You know, I really believe
that what are organizations basically made up of people? Right?
(11:51):
And I think it's individuals who are showing up in
the context of an organization. So I think starts with
an individual. So think about individuals. Why do we behave
the way we do? I think behaviors are an output
of your thoughts. Your thoughts come from your deeply held values,
and we all have it. We may be aware of it,
conscious unconscious, but we all have values. Analogy is like
(12:14):
a tree. You know that the values are like the
roots that nobody can see. The trunk is like the
thoughts and the leaves of the manifestation of your behavior
that people can see. So we all come with our
different values and thoughts and behaviors right now in an organization,
what you do is that you essentially identify that common
ground of values. And these values, by the way, and
(12:37):
nothing mystical. I mean, these are very you know, values
that we all have grown up with then we know
to be true. But because of our life's experiences and
what's important to us, we may have different levels of
hierarchy of importance of these values. But values drive your
thoughts and that therefore behavior. If you have predictability of behavior,
(12:58):
that's how you build rust in a group setting. Right,
So to build trust in a group setting, you need
to have consistency of thinking, which can only come from
a convergence of values. So by surfacing those values and
articulating them in terms of what's important to you and
how you show up, so that you can build a trusting,
(13:20):
collaborative work environment. And if you hire against that, then
people just naturally have to be that they don't have
to be like anybody else. And if you therefore build
a culture basis those values that you have now articulated,
you have a much higher likelihood of building collaborative, trusting
(13:42):
teams um that can be focused on being the best
selves every single day and whatever they do, and competing
with people outside the organization and collaborating within the organization,
and then it becomes an enjoyable, joyful place to work
and you feel like it you've created that you've field
because I find that I find. I find that many entrepreneurs,
(14:06):
many business owners, find that finding good people is so difficult,
managing groups of people is so difficult, and work ethic
that old school hard work work ethic is really hard
to find. And if you just have that, you will
(14:26):
go so far. Because so many people think it's about
shortcuts because of social media, because everything is so immediate.
Everybody thinks like you could just sort of cheat your
way into being successful, and most people don't realize that
it really goes back to the fifties and like when
we you know, oh, school hard work is really the
(14:47):
way to be successful. And it's hard to drill that
into people. They want they want to count their hours
and when is my holiday and when is my break
and of course with you know, everything having to be
so by the book, especially in corporate environment. And I
wonder how honestly you run a big company like this
and how you really can find that and find people
(15:09):
to all sort of align and then still enjoy their job,
because to keep people on the path means, you know,
you have to be a little rigid, so then to
have everybody enjoy, you know, it's great to enjoy casual
fridays and everybody loves each other and your private chef,
speare employees over Google and it's great. But to keep
everybody working hard, I find it's very challenging. Yeah, you know. UM,
(15:34):
I'm also rather old fashioned like you. UM. I believe
in the importance of hard work, um, of putting in
the effort and being focused on the effort more than
expecting a certain reward, you know, all those good old
fashioned things of collaborating and being there for each other,
loyalty and and that type of stuff, and showing up
like that and being grateful, you know, being grateful to
(15:56):
have the jobs that we do and the impact that
we can have and have in that gratitude and not
a sense of entitlement, but a deep sense of commitment,
you know. So I think it's it's possible to do
in an organization only if the leader at the top
is wired up in that same way you know where
he values humanity, he he, he values people being authentic.
(16:20):
So let me share with you my world view on
driving results. Firstly, I think that organizations exist for three things.
One is to create enterprise value, but also to help
unlock the dreams of the people in your organization, and
also to serve the community of which you're a part of.
(16:41):
And I'm not just saying this because it sounds good.
I'm saying it because it makes business sense. Because only
if you have a people and community agenda can the
enterprise value that you create be sustainable, you know, in
this new world. Otherwise it won't be sustainable. So that's
my that's that's what I believe is important now. To
be able to deliver that. You obviously need strategy. Everybody
knows that. You know, you need to know how to win.
(17:02):
That's to do with the intellect. But more than strategy,
you need execution. And I really think that people who
execute are the ones who win. People who execute better. Right,
So then execution is a function not of the head,
but of the heart, which is inspiring your teams to
want to win, to want to do it more than
anybody else. Right, how do you do that? I mean how?
(17:26):
I mean? You can't just make a PowerPoint presentation on
a studies of framework and where you're going, and it's
just not going to happen unless you are able to
connect and inspire the people that you work with. And
that inspiration comes only by having the right people and
what you said. The right people, I mean people who
have the right attitude you just talked about inspiring and
(17:58):
to win. You have to include them in the playbook
and make them chess players and checkers players. They have
to be see that they can be part of something
and they can also succeed to There's nothing worse than
them thinking you're gonna win, but they are going to
be sitting in the same position. That's where I think
it's key exactly. That's why I said, you know they
(18:19):
you have to be a catalyst to help unlock the
dreams of the people who work with you and show
them the way on how their lives and the lives
of the families can be transformed. That there has to
be a clear link. So back to execution. So execution
for me is right people, which is a function of
the right attitude, doing the right few things you know
(18:41):
that are highly focused the right way and the right
way is what I started our conversation about, which is culture,
which is behavior, which is you know, values. If you
have those three things lined up, the right people who
are wired up similarly doing the right few things the
right way, and all of that is possible only if
I show up with my personal commitment to the right
(19:05):
way every single day. You know, like and I ask people,
you have to hold me accountable. I this is what's
important to us, and it starts with me and with
my executive team. I believe, only if you have the
executive team that walks the walk, talks to talk on
the stuff, can it really embedd in the organization and
(19:26):
become a way in which you operate well. Also on
small scale, for me, I have a smaller business, but
I work harder than anybody that works for me. Not
a question in the world. I mean, there's no one
that would ever say I'm quote unquote lucky that I
work for everything. So even though I you know, I'm
not easy to work for because I demand excellence, you know,
(19:48):
because I give, I give, and I admit when I'm wrong.
And so you're leading by example. You have to be
somebody who's walking the walk. Um, so you've experienced great
changes during the pandemic. Panera is you know, I think
an American household name as far as it's in so
many strip malls, it's got it's got a very clear
brand when you walk in the door. I'm a natural
(20:10):
food chef, so one of the reasons I wanted to
speak to you, which you're a different guest than many
of my guests. I wanted to speak to you because
of the social consciousness of the company, how it how
it appears to me, the way you handled your employees
during the pandemic, the way it looks to me not
only to be good to them, but as the long
view in your business, because you want you knew you'd come.
(20:31):
You hope you bounce back if you did things right,
and you'd want these people back. So both as a
good conscious decision, conscientious decision, but also a business decision,
and as a natural food chef that it seems like
the brand is about trust ingredients you can pronounce, eat
real foods. It's straightforward, there's no gimmicks, and it's good
quality food in a more fast food environment. That's how
(20:54):
I'm seeing this whole thing. And I remember because I
have a house in the Hampton's and there Spridge Hampton
Commons and there's a preneera there and it was really
one of the only places open during the pandemic that
I can remember. So I'm aware of this brand and
I wanted to sort of hear about it. And I
(21:14):
like the brand because it's clean, it's straightforward, it's heartwarming,
you know, the smell, the visuals, the breads, the muffins,
the little like healthy. I think loaf cakes and things
you can see that that attracts me as a natural
food chef, soups soups, clean, you know, nice people. But yeah,
(21:35):
it's also like you can it's fast, so you can
go in and get like a trusted sandwich that you're
canna feel good about. And I remember seeing lobsters out
on the man lobster rolls at one point, so it's
a little elevated like there you'll you'll nail things that
would normally not happen in a fast food environment, like
lobster is not something I'd normally think about in a
strip mall. So I'm aware of the brand, and I'm
(21:56):
interested in the fact that you like I had the
CEO of Tammy Bahama, you know, you know, freaking out
a little in the beginning of the pandemic. You're talking
about billions on your shoulders, and these are the moments
that you kind of have to just like take a
deep breath, collect yourself, pull yourself up in your bootstraps,
and figure out what the hell are you're gonna do?
And you may be right, you may be wrong, but
(22:17):
you've got a charter course and it's the road less traveled.
So what was that? Like? What what did you do? Yeah, well,
I'm delighted that you that you like Banaro so much
and captured the essence really well. You know, we call
it kind of fast casual, which is the food quality
of casual dining and the accessibility of fast food, you know,
so it's kind of in the in the middle. It's
(22:38):
for consumers who don't want to compromise. There's no compromise
between crepibility and quality of food, no compromise between convenience
and speed. So I think you captured it. Well. Um
So pandemic was, you know what, what a disruptive event.
And I had just become CEO in I was just
getting around getting my head around it. You know, I
was living in as you mentioned the Greem, I was
(22:59):
living in London before I just moved to Boston May
twenty nineteen, excited about the new venture, trying to get
my head around it. How do I follow in the
in the footsteps of an incredibly successful founder CEO UM
and you know, take the brand further because it's been
so successful and I was wrapping my head around it,
and the pandemic hit us, and you know, it hit
(23:22):
us very hard. We lost almost half of our business
in like five days, you know, just completely collapsed. Um
And I think in hindsight, I think there was several
moments of learning and reflection that I want to share
with you and the listeners. Which is one is, you know,
when something is so unprecedented, the first thing to do
(23:45):
is to remain calm. And it's quite counterintuitive because you know,
you kind of maybe want to jump into action mode
and do something right, and you have to do quite
the opposite. You have to actually take a step back
and say, this is unprecedented. There's no playbook here, and
let me first identify what is truly important, you know,
(24:08):
for myself and my team. And we identified that the
two most important things were safety of our customers and
our employees and protection preservation of our brand and business.
Those two things the most important. Next, I think we realize, okay,
as we do these two things together, it was quite
obvious we'll have to take some very hard decisions, you know,
to protect ourselves. Um. So what other filters and values
(24:33):
that we will apply as a lens as we make
those hard decisions. So a few kind of emerged. One most.
You know, even if you do the hard things, we
must do it with compassion and heart and do to respect.
You can do tough things, but you can do them
in a very respectful fashion. We reminded ourselves of how
Panera actually thinks of ourselves. We think of ourselves as
(24:56):
one family, and you know, family family sort of sacrific
eises for each other. Is there for each other? And
the third mindset was, you know, let's not burn the furniture.
This this tool shall end, you know, so let's not
kind of overreact, you know this. And then finally, how
might we use this as a catalyst to become stronger? Right,
(25:19):
it's such a destructive event. We now have the permission
to actually accelerate all the changes that we were thinking
of doing over three years. We can do that in
three months, yes, because that's the snowball. But shaken, That's
what I said in the beginning, the snowball for shaking,
so so run over. You know, I agree with you,
and you don't know what to do. Sits still, but
then you collect yourself and you figure out you know,
(25:41):
that's what's interesting. You have to pick a lane and
do something. You have to pick a lane, do something
and actually have a mindset of I'm going to use
this as an opportunity to get better, right right. This
is where when I was talking before about sort of
being a little bit of a maverick and being an entrepreneur,
this is when you see what your team is made of.
Because often the machine is just moving and I'm sure
(26:04):
you're making great strides, but it's not usually that there's
so much action and so much hustle in a corporate
environment corporate corpse. You know, corporations move very slowly, like
a big cruise ship making a turn. But in this case,
you're talking about everybody really like kicking into high gear
and having to be hustlers during a pandemic And was
there how much of a hit did you take, like
(26:27):
from the beginning of the pandemic to now bouncing back?
What's the what's what? What's the aggregate? Like? How much
of it? Where are you now? Where were you? How
much of the e commerce and social media help? Like?
What what's the takeaway? First on the first piece that
you said you right. You know, organizations can slow down
the bigger they are, the more you know, and it
(26:47):
requires a lot of work to have the speed of
a startup. Right and Peta and Panetta, we have this
mindset of speed of a startup. We think in days,
we think in days, we're not thinking years out here.
So so I think very fortunate to have, you know,
that kind of a culture in the company. And as
you know, very often crisis creates a collaboration, which is
(27:09):
you know, which is like disproportionate. People come together in
ways that you would never expect. So I'm really fortunate
to have the team and the culture, and also our
franchise partners. By the way, our franchise partners on half
of our cafes and we work very much as one team,
one era, and they were also phenomenal through this entire event.
To your question on the business, where are we now?
(27:31):
So we totally we lost half of our business. Now
we are in positive territory over the last few months,
you know, we've recovered completely, and most of that is
essentially down to the fact that be pivoted, you know,
quickly off premise from sixty pre pandemic to post pandemic
off premise, off premise, I mean curbside and delivery and
(27:53):
drives throughout all the kind of stuff digital from of
her total revenue, to of her to to revenue and
are so as we have emerged, as we have emerged
fast forward. Today we're a stronger Panera. You know, We're
a stronger brand that is innovated, by the way, very fast.
There's another thing that happened to the pandemic apart from
(28:14):
what I mentioned. Imagine that we launched two new platforms.
I don't know if you've tried the flatbread pizza, but
we launched a totally new platform called Flatbread Pizzas, which
is pizza's done the Panera way think of it. We're
all sitting remote in zoom Land, don't have access to
(28:36):
our test kitchen, can't go out and taste any products.
And in October last year, we launched this mega new
platform which is quite complicated across the entire state, and
we are now the the fifteenth largest pizza company in
the US, you know, six months ago. So it's a
(28:56):
happy accident. I mean, I know, obviously the pan It
is tragic and we're not forgetting that. But I'm saying
you would have never realized of these things. I mean,
this is a happy accident. These are all of the
sort of things that you had to realize during unfortunate circumstances.
(29:24):
So do you think for people that are you know,
have small businesses entrepreneurs um that traditional marketing is not
where you should really be spending your time, energy and money,
that social media and e commerce is where it's at
that that for you as a company, are you still
spending money on traditional marketing? Are you you mentioned Oprah
(29:46):
and Deepak Chopra. Do spokespeople matter what matters the most,
what matters, what really moves the needle if you only
have a small budget. So I think for our listeners
who may have smaller businesses, I think it all comes
down to what is your proposition and who is your
target consumer? And then what is the most efficient way
(30:07):
to reach out to that target consumer in a way
that is very personal and in a way in which
you give that same message to that consumer multiple times
so that it regists registers. That's kind of the media strategy,
and it you know, varies from business to business. I
think we still believe in the power of h of
(30:29):
you know, traditional media. I think that's still very impactful.
We believe in that. However, we're spending more and more
of our budget into digital and e commerce because you know,
the I think the mobile phone, I think is the
media outlet for the future. And I think because you know,
(30:50):
as I say, energy equal to one, your consumer is
basically now one. And being able to microsegment an individual
consumer and to be a to reach out to that
consumer in a way that's not a intrusive, that engages
and entertains that particular customer, you have to think about
how you can do that, and I think there is
(31:11):
where digital, e commerce, social, et cetera. Can really score.
So I think I would say it depends on what
your business is, how much budget you have, and who
you're going after. But the general trend is more micro
micro micro. You know, let me really understand each and
every consumer that I have and serve them better than
(31:32):
anybody else. What about scaling? What's the most important thing
when you go from one thing that's somewhat successful, seems
to be a good idea and expanding in a thoughtful
way that's not going to blow blow you up, because
expansion is great, but it can also be a brand destroyer.
So I would say the overriding umbrella thought is discipline,
(31:57):
you know, and let me just expand on that. First,
to be disciplined, to get a very clear brand idea
that you have, an idea that is serving a real
need that exists that nobody else can serve better than you.
That's the most important thing. First off, is this something
(32:18):
unique that you're doing that nobody else can do better
than you? So that has to be a tick. Once
that is a tick, you move on to the second base,
which is around can I make money? And how do
I make money? Um, you know, what is my business
model in terms of my revenue and my costs and
how does that square up? And can I make the
kind of returns today? But also at scale? What will
(32:41):
it really take? An understanding and doing the maths is
very very important before you start running with the ball.
I've done that wrong. I did that wrong. Where you're
you know, you're planning as you go and and we
have to do a little of that to be we
have to we have to do a little building the
plane while flying. I'm still doing it, but you have
(33:02):
to be smart and be able to at least add
up the numbers as you're going or have people around you,
they can do that. You can't do that when you
work at a six billion dollar major company with locations
that can't work. You can't just fly by the seat
of your pants. But butting, entrepreneurs have to be a
little bit more running gun a little bit, Yeah, they
have to. So I think this is one step that
you know, very often people get so excited and emotionally
(33:25):
committed to that idea. Yes, they started running before they
have the discipline of you know, putting down the numbers.
You know. And these numbers, by the way, don't have
to be scary. I mean, they have to be an
articulation of fact, which is today it is this, more growth,
it could be this, you know, and so on and
so forth, your seat in trenches, because every business will
(33:48):
have like a step change trajectory. You know. The last
question is how do you how does get back? Well?
I think firstly, it's a very important part of who
I am and have been for many years. You know,
have a personal story. I lost two of my daughters
over the years, and that loss has really sort of
deepened my sense of compassion and desire to give back.
(34:10):
Uh In in my individual capacity, but also how to
use the companies of which I am a part of
as a force multiplier for good. You know. So that's
kind of the mindset with which I come. Um supernea
UM has in its heart core DNA is to be
good and do good. You know. It's it's a you
(34:33):
describe the brand like, it's kind of fits very naturally
with the quality of our ingredients and and the value
and ethos that we have that we will serve food
only that WEEO will serve to our own families. You know,
it's that type of our brand. So UM, I think
we have you know, signature programs UM such as end
of Day donation where we donate all our unsold bakery
(34:56):
and sweet good items every every day to more than
four thousand nonprofit NGOs worth about hunand and fifty million
dollars a year. You know, that's a standard signature program.
We have other fundraising efforts that we do. But the
two things that I'm most passionate about right now is
(35:18):
impacting global warming and climate change and diversity and inclusion.
Let me talk about both of those. I think on
climate change, as you know, it's a very serious probably
one of the biggest threats that we all face collectively,
and food production contributes to one third of greenhouse gas emissions.
(35:39):
You know, food production, fossil fuels, accept everybody understands, but
people really often don't get that connection of food production
and therefore I think it would be irresponsible for food
retail companies not to take that into account and to
do something. So what we have done is we've partnered
with the World Resources Institute and measured the carbon footprint
(36:02):
impact of a plate of food at Panera to identify
that forty of what we serve is what we call
cool foods or climate friendly, and we've labeled them that
in that in Panera. Now, so if you go into
open Era and you want to have a positive impact
in climate, you can eat what is labeled as school food,
you know, and and and we have a growing commitment
(36:24):
to as plant based, etcetera. So that's one aspect of impact.
The second one on diversity and inclusion is is a
deeply held personal value of mind that you know, we
should make Panera the world that we wish to see
because we have limited control on the world, but all
the control within Paneria. So why can't Panera be a
shining example of a world within Pania that is compassionate,
(36:48):
that is inclusive and respectful, that is tolerant, that is embracing,
whether it is differences in race, religion, you know, color, set,
your orientation, or any kind of difference. Why can't we
be a melting pot and embrace diversity and towards that end,
we have, you know, three pillars that we're thinking of.
(37:10):
One is kind of how can we have more representation
That kind of everybody does, and we're focusing more on
gender and race right now, so more representation. The second
is represent representation in impact positions, which means leadership, you know,
so not just representation, but impact positions representation. And the third,
(37:31):
which is right now a dream, which is how can
we create a program where we can have generational progress
for very talented and skilled um children from underprivileged backgrounds,
Because I really believe that success of the function of
ability and opportunity, and many of these children are very,
(37:52):
very skilled, but they never have the opportunity and Camponera
create that opportunity for those talented youngsters who are within
the Panea family right now and give them an accelerated
path of generational progress. It could be maybe ten families,
it could be maybe fifteen families, but you will transform
(38:13):
their lives forever, you know. So are those are a
few things appear if you're thinking of, well, this was
wonderful and so much takeaway, as almost as much takeaway
as we've had any interview. And I'm pleasantly surprised. So
that was amazing, pleasantly surprised. I have another surprise for you. Okay. Now,
we talked about fun, right, fun at work? So I'm
(38:36):
going to sing you a song. Okay? Is that okay? Sure? Perfect?
So you talked about, you know, how do people have fun?
Any show up as authentic self and there's too much
corporate blah blah blah. I just want to give you
a feel for what it's like to work at Banera,
where we're just having fun and being ourselves. So I
keep writing songs. I get inspired by Banera's renovations. This
(38:58):
song is on coffee. Okay, okay, the coffee subscription program.
Everybody deserves it. Great cup of coffee is coffee so
damn expensive, but never has great coffee. We will it's accessible.
(39:30):
We will make it accessible to everybody. That's that's amazing.
That's amazing. That's like when you know Adam Sandlers things
about Hanukkah, that's really great. It's like it's like good,
good and funny. Um, that's awesome. That was a great song.
What a great note to end up. Awesome, Thank you Bye.
(39:59):
I was really prized by this conversation. I have to
say I have different types of people on here because
I want to appeal to different types of people and
I want to have different conversations. But I'm really fascinated
by these big companies and I'm fascinated by the leaders
and these companies because many of you work in the
corporate space and don't want to feel like you have
to apologize for that, and like that means that you're
(40:19):
not really an entrepreneur, that you're not really a maverick,
that you don't really have serious, intense decisions to make
and ways to navigate this whole landscape. So, you know,
I thought that someone who's running such a massive, multibillion
dollars company might be a little dry, and that, you know,
the conversation might be not over our heads, but just
(40:41):
not really someplace where we would get amazing business advice.
I was shocked. I thought it was one of the
best conversations I've had to really get tactical and practical
strategic advice from someone who had to really make hard
decisions getting this new job right before a pan that
so you're taking over a multility about company right for
(41:02):
for a pandemic, you have to prove yourself and also
you have to react and just figure it out. So
I thought it was a great conversation. I'm interested to
hear what you think. Uh do remember to rate, review
and subscribe to appreciate it so much. Thank you. Just
(41:23):
b is hosted an executive produced by me Bethany Frankel.
Just Be as a production of be Real Productions and
I Heart Radio. Our managing producer is Fiona Smith and
our producer is Stephanie Sender. Our EP is Morgan Levoy.
To catch more moments from the show, follow us on
Instagram at Just Be with Bethany
So we all come with our different values and thoughts
and behaviors. Right now, in an organization, what you do
is that you essentially identify that common ground of values.
And these values, by the way, and nothing mystical. I mean,
these are very you know, values that we all have
grown up with and we know to be true. But
(00:22):
because of our life's experiences and what's important to us,
we may have different levels of hierarchy of importance of
these values. But values drive your thoughts and that therefore behavior.
If you have predictability of behavior, that's how you build
trust in a group setting. Right. I want to talk
(00:54):
about the term cheater brand that I brought into the
reality television vernacular, like into this sort of pop culture
vernacular because years ago Sonja, who I really like it
is sweet and root for uh, launched a wine brand
named Tipsy Girl, which I referred to on the show
(01:16):
as a cheater brand because I was upset that she
was launching a rose in a very copycat like name
to skinny Girl, and I was aggressive. And people love
Sonya and she's totally the you know, underdog, and I
understand why people were upset with the delivery of that um.
(01:37):
But I referred to that as a cheater brand. So
recently I posted that I'm launching a line of a clients.
Is one is this sort of like air fryar oven,
So I guess it's like a larger toaster of it
and it make can make pizza and all these different things.
And I'm launching a bunch of appliances. I'm in about
thirty categories. Newer ones are coffee syrups and cherry juice
and swim and a bunch of different things. So I
(02:02):
just in a Instant Graham story was making something and
I mentioned that I was going to launch this, and
people were like cheater brand because Sonja, I guess, had
the idea to do a toaster of a mine, but
she never launched the toaster ovens like it was a
traditional toaster of it. And I love that idea because
cooking in a toaster of it is a great idea. Um.
And so I'm going to launch a line of appliances
(02:24):
with the name Skinny Girl. The brand is Skinny Girl.
So when I called it, when I called Tipsy Girl
a cheater brand, it was because of the name Tipsy Girl.
It wasn't because she was going into wine, like someone
else launching sneakers is not a cheater brand. Someone calling
a brand swoosh with a logo that's similar to the
(02:46):
Nike logo, which couldnt happen because they'd sue you your
ass off. That would be a cheater brand. So after
my Skinny Girl came out, Applebee's came out with a
skinny be margharita, and everywhere there was a skinny margharita,
and that's because I'm b And then skinny pizza and
skinny latte is and all that came after the skinny
brawl Margharita. That's a cheater brand. If a brand is
(03:08):
like a gimmick and knocked off a little bit, then
that's a cheater brand. And interestingly enough, I'm doing a
cheater brand of my own brand because I don't own
Skinny Girl in alcohol or cocktails or intent to use
with alcohol or cocktails, So meaning I can't do a
(03:29):
line of cocktail mixers under the brand Skinny Girl because
I've sold that years ago. Only the cocktail portion I
percent of my brand. Otherwise, so I'm launching a brand
called Thirsty Girl, which is cocktail mixers. So it's like
a gimmick where I'm copying myself. So I'm creating a
cheater brand of myself. But the idea of going into
(03:51):
mixers is not a cheater brand a low calorie cocktail
because I created that category. Meaning before this any girl margarita,
there was never It was the first ever low calorie
ready to drink a cocktail. So someone else coming up
with a low calorie cocktail is it's more of like
(04:12):
a cheater category because it would depend upon the name
of the brand. But anyone doing that, that's that's copying
the idea. That's not even technically the Cheetah brand. It's
a cheater product, which is not a real term. But anyway,
so if I'm doing an air fryer of an appliance
and Sonya who never launched one, but even if she
(04:33):
had launched one, this would be a cheater product. A
bunch of people launched cocktails after and as a result
of my skinny Girl deal. Uh So that's just a
little lesson about what a cheater brand is and isn't.
So what cheater brands have you seen? And you get
the difference between the cheater brand and the cheater product,
(04:54):
But it's really funny, people like, look at you launching
a toaster. Cheater brand was sowing you, and I'm like, well,
Sonia and launch a toaster. But a toaster is an
item that is very common in people's homes. And I'm
not launching a toaster. I'm launching an elevated, uh convenient
oven um. But I appreciated people's protection and fervor for
this topic. And to use a word and like a
(05:17):
terminology back to me that I introduced into the vernacular.
But you should sort of understand what something is before
you talk about it. My guest today is now Written Chattery,
who was named CEO of Panera Bread in May of
(05:38):
two thousand nineteen, right before a very crazy roller coaster
time in our country and our world. Marion has more
than twenty five years of international corporate leadership experience in
the food, retail and hospitality industry. He joined Panera from
Crispy Kreme, where he served as CELLO and President of
the International division, and before then, he spent twenty three
(06:01):
years at Young Brands in a number of different positions,
including serving as a President of Young India and most
recently in the role of President of KFC Global. So
He's got a lot of experience in the food industry,
big companies, big trends, big business. And we talked today
about why you need to inspire your team in order
to succeed, the importance of staying calm during a crisis,
(06:26):
looking out for your team. Hey, you can use calamity
as an opportunity to improve your business, and why you
need to lead by example. He is an incredibly successful
business leader, and I think you're really going to learn
a lot from his interview. I definitely did. I was
shocked and surprised by some of the information that I
got today. It will be amazing for business people. So
(06:46):
I thought it was a great conversation. I'm interested to
hear what you think. UH do remember to rate, review
and subscribe. I appreciate it so much. Thank you there
so um. The first question I have is have you
(07:07):
always been a corporate more structured person, meaning do you
have that individual entrepreneurial spirit or you've always felt more
comfortable sort of working in a team pack hierarchy mentality,
because I know you were a Crispy Cream before and
Young Brands, which is a major, UH public company, So
(07:29):
that's a serious These are serious places that you're working,
and I wonder if you've ever been out on your own. No,
I've always um had a corporate career, um, but I
think always had the mindset of being myself wherever I
was at, and you know, being authentically who I am.
(07:52):
So I've never felt that I had to pretend to
be anybody I'm not. So I would say that even
if I was on my own and doing my own thing,
I would pretty much lead the way that I lead
with at least companies, because there's a convergence of you know,
values and beliefs and what's important. So you're able to
(08:15):
experience individualism within the corporate structure because a lot of
people listening, you know, we talked to a lot of
people here that are mavericks and brand builders in a
non traditional sets. But then many people listening work within
a corporate structure, uh, something more professional or you do
have to play the game, work within a group. It's
(08:36):
not for everybody. Some people must be in a group mentality,
they need that support. Some people must be individual you know.
For me, I don't know how I would be working
within the corporate landscape. I think I'd be living in
fear of the time. So for the people who do
work within some sort of a structure and corporate landscape,
I want to talk to them about how they can
(08:58):
be individual and still be entrepreneurs and get to the top,
you know, and still be Maverick game changers. Yeah, so
I think, you know, how can you bring your own
game in the most authentic way every single day at
your place of work is a very liberating place to
(09:20):
be in. And I think that can happen only if
you are fortunate to work in a company that mirrors
and reflects the values that you believe in, and it
has a culture that allows you to be that, you know.
So I think that at Young Brands, at Krispy Kream,
at Panera UM, and whether I was you know, growing
(09:41):
up in the organization or you know, I was leading
the company, I've always felt that this business culture of
that respects individuality and people turning up as their authentic selves,
which helps them unleash their true potential. So I think
you have to to be to do that. You have
to find a company that allows you to do that
(10:03):
and allows you to be you. And I do believe
you know that, UM. Part of my role now at
an Era for example is to make sure I'm creating
a culture of trust. By that, I mean having a
clear set of behaviors and values that defines how we
(10:23):
want to show up, how we want to you know,
how we want to treat each other, how we want
to behave And if you have clarity on those values,
then you can use that as a filter in the
people that you hire, the people that you grow, the
people that you exit, so that avert a period of time,
the people who within the organization all believe in the
(10:43):
same common ways of of behaving, so that now you're
speaking my language. Where um, that's about branding. That's about
every single person knowing what the culture of the companies
and or they may not on the first day, they
may sense of it, but that you running the show
there and driving the ship, you know exactly what the
(11:06):
culture is. And every person you hire, and every ad
campaign and every new program you implement has to adhere
to that line. And that's where the twain meet in
my opinion, because whether you're a corporate employee or an
individual entrepreneur, you need to understand what the brand of
what you're doing is and you have to adhere to that.
(11:27):
Sometimes you change you adjust the brand proposition in a pandemic,
you absolutely have to, but that all lines adhere to that.
So we talk about that a lot. So that was
interesting that you sort of mention that. Let me, let
me just react to that. You know, I really believe
that what are organizations basically made up of people? Right?
(11:51):
And I think it's individuals who are showing up in
the context of an organization. So I think starts with
an individual. So think about individuals. Why do we behave
the way we do? I think behaviors are an output
of your thoughts. Your thoughts come from your deeply held values,
and we all have it. We may be aware of it,
conscious unconscious, but we all have values. Analogy is like
(12:14):
a tree. You know that the values are like the
roots that nobody can see. The trunk is like the
thoughts and the leaves of the manifestation of your behavior
that people can see. So we all come with our
different values and thoughts and behaviors right now in an organization,
what you do is that you essentially identify that common
ground of values. And these values, by the way, and
(12:37):
nothing mystical. I mean, these are very you know, values
that we all have grown up with then we know
to be true. But because of our life's experiences and
what's important to us, we may have different levels of
hierarchy of importance of these values. But values drive your
thoughts and that therefore behavior. If you have predictability of behavior,
(12:58):
that's how you build rust in a group setting. Right,
So to build trust in a group setting, you need
to have consistency of thinking, which can only come from
a convergence of values. So by surfacing those values and
articulating them in terms of what's important to you and
how you show up, so that you can build a trusting,
(13:20):
collaborative work environment. And if you hire against that, then
people just naturally have to be that they don't have
to be like anybody else. And if you therefore build
a culture basis those values that you have now articulated,
you have a much higher likelihood of building collaborative, trusting
(13:42):
teams um that can be focused on being the best
selves every single day and whatever they do, and competing
with people outside the organization and collaborating within the organization,
and then it becomes an enjoyable, joyful place to work
and you feel like it you've created that you've field
because I find that I find. I find that many entrepreneurs,
(14:06):
many business owners, find that finding good people is so difficult,
managing groups of people is so difficult, and work ethic
that old school hard work work ethic is really hard
to find. And if you just have that, you will
(14:26):
go so far. Because so many people think it's about
shortcuts because of social media, because everything is so immediate.
Everybody thinks like you could just sort of cheat your
way into being successful, and most people don't realize that
it really goes back to the fifties and like when
we you know, oh, school hard work is really the
(14:47):
way to be successful. And it's hard to drill that
into people. They want they want to count their hours
and when is my holiday and when is my break
and of course with you know, everything having to be
so by the book, especially in corporate environment. And I
wonder how honestly you run a big company like this
and how you really can find that and find people
(15:09):
to all sort of align and then still enjoy their job,
because to keep people on the path means, you know,
you have to be a little rigid, so then to
have everybody enjoy, you know, it's great to enjoy casual
fridays and everybody loves each other and your private chef,
speare employees over Google and it's great. But to keep
everybody working hard, I find it's very challenging. Yeah, you know. UM,
(15:34):
I'm also rather old fashioned like you. UM. I believe
in the importance of hard work, um, of putting in
the effort and being focused on the effort more than
expecting a certain reward, you know, all those good old
fashioned things of collaborating and being there for each other,
loyalty and and that type of stuff, and showing up
like that and being grateful, you know, being grateful to
(15:56):
have the jobs that we do and the impact that
we can have and have in that gratitude and not
a sense of entitlement, but a deep sense of commitment,
you know. So I think it's it's possible to do
in an organization only if the leader at the top
is wired up in that same way you know where
he values humanity, he he, he values people being authentic.
(16:20):
So let me share with you my world view on
driving results. Firstly, I think that organizations exist for three things.
One is to create enterprise value, but also to help
unlock the dreams of the people in your organization, and
also to serve the community of which you're a part of.
(16:41):
And I'm not just saying this because it sounds good.
I'm saying it because it makes business sense. Because only
if you have a people and community agenda can the
enterprise value that you create be sustainable, you know, in
this new world. Otherwise it won't be sustainable. So that's
my that's that's what I believe is important now. To
be able to deliver that. You obviously need strategy. Everybody
knows that. You know, you need to know how to win.
(17:02):
That's to do with the intellect. But more than strategy,
you need execution. And I really think that people who
execute are the ones who win. People who execute better. Right,
So then execution is a function not of the head,
but of the heart, which is inspiring your teams to
want to win, to want to do it more than
anybody else. Right, how do you do that? I mean how?
(17:26):
I mean? You can't just make a PowerPoint presentation on
a studies of framework and where you're going, and it's
just not going to happen unless you are able to
connect and inspire the people that you work with. And
that inspiration comes only by having the right people and
what you said. The right people, I mean people who
have the right attitude you just talked about inspiring and
(17:58):
to win. You have to include them in the playbook
and make them chess players and checkers players. They have
to be see that they can be part of something
and they can also succeed to There's nothing worse than
them thinking you're gonna win, but they are going to
be sitting in the same position. That's where I think
it's key exactly. That's why I said, you know they
(18:19):
you have to be a catalyst to help unlock the
dreams of the people who work with you and show
them the way on how their lives and the lives
of the families can be transformed. That there has to
be a clear link. So back to execution. So execution
for me is right people, which is a function of
the right attitude, doing the right few things you know
(18:41):
that are highly focused the right way and the right
way is what I started our conversation about, which is culture,
which is behavior, which is you know, values. If you
have those three things lined up, the right people who
are wired up similarly doing the right few things the
right way, and all of that is possible only if
I show up with my personal commitment to the right
(19:05):
way every single day. You know, like and I ask people,
you have to hold me accountable. I this is what's
important to us, and it starts with me and with
my executive team. I believe, only if you have the
executive team that walks the walk, talks to talk on
the stuff, can it really embedd in the organization and
(19:26):
become a way in which you operate well. Also on
small scale, for me, I have a smaller business, but
I work harder than anybody that works for me. Not
a question in the world. I mean, there's no one
that would ever say I'm quote unquote lucky that I
work for everything. So even though I you know, I'm
not easy to work for because I demand excellence, you know,
(19:48):
because I give, I give, and I admit when I'm wrong.
And so you're leading by example. You have to be
somebody who's walking the walk. Um, so you've experienced great
changes during the pandemic. Panera is you know, I think
an American household name as far as it's in so
many strip malls, it's got it's got a very clear
brand when you walk in the door. I'm a natural
(20:10):
food chef, so one of the reasons I wanted to
speak to you, which you're a different guest than many
of my guests. I wanted to speak to you because
of the social consciousness of the company, how it how
it appears to me, the way you handled your employees
during the pandemic, the way it looks to me not
only to be good to them, but as the long
view in your business, because you want you knew you'd come.
(20:31):
You hope you bounce back if you did things right,
and you'd want these people back. So both as a
good conscious decision, conscientious decision, but also a business decision,
and as a natural food chef that it seems like
the brand is about trust ingredients you can pronounce, eat
real foods. It's straightforward, there's no gimmicks, and it's good
quality food in a more fast food environment. That's how
(20:54):
I'm seeing this whole thing. And I remember because I
have a house in the Hampton's and there Spridge Hampton
Commons and there's a preneera there and it was really
one of the only places open during the pandemic that
I can remember. So I'm aware of this brand and
I wanted to sort of hear about it. And I
(21:14):
like the brand because it's clean, it's straightforward, it's heartwarming,
you know, the smell, the visuals, the breads, the muffins,
the little like healthy. I think loaf cakes and things
you can see that that attracts me as a natural
food chef, soups soups, clean, you know, nice people. But yeah,
(21:35):
it's also like you can it's fast, so you can
go in and get like a trusted sandwich that you're
canna feel good about. And I remember seeing lobsters out
on the man lobster rolls at one point, so it's
a little elevated like there you'll you'll nail things that
would normally not happen in a fast food environment, like
lobster is not something I'd normally think about in a
strip mall. So I'm aware of the brand, and I'm
(21:56):
interested in the fact that you like I had the
CEO of Tammy Bahama, you know, you know, freaking out
a little in the beginning of the pandemic. You're talking
about billions on your shoulders, and these are the moments
that you kind of have to just like take a
deep breath, collect yourself, pull yourself up in your bootstraps,
and figure out what the hell are you're gonna do?
And you may be right, you may be wrong, but
(22:17):
you've got a charter course and it's the road less traveled.
So what was that? Like? What what did you do? Yeah, well,
I'm delighted that you that you like Banaro so much
and captured the essence really well. You know, we call
it kind of fast casual, which is the food quality
of casual dining and the accessibility of fast food, you know,
so it's kind of in the in the middle. It's
(22:38):
for consumers who don't want to compromise. There's no compromise
between crepibility and quality of food, no compromise between convenience
and speed. So I think you captured it. Well. Um
So pandemic was, you know what, what a disruptive event.
And I had just become CEO in I was just
getting around getting my head around it. You know, I
was living in as you mentioned the Greem, I was
(22:59):
living in London before I just moved to Boston May
twenty nineteen, excited about the new venture, trying to get
my head around it. How do I follow in the
in the footsteps of an incredibly successful founder CEO UM
and you know, take the brand further because it's been
so successful and I was wrapping my head around it,
and the pandemic hit us, and you know, it hit
(23:22):
us very hard. We lost almost half of our business
in like five days, you know, just completely collapsed. Um
And I think in hindsight, I think there was several
moments of learning and reflection that I want to share
with you and the listeners. Which is one is, you know,
when something is so unprecedented, the first thing to do
(23:45):
is to remain calm. And it's quite counterintuitive because you know,
you kind of maybe want to jump into action mode
and do something right, and you have to do quite
the opposite. You have to actually take a step back
and say, this is unprecedented. There's no playbook here, and
let me first identify what is truly important, you know,
(24:08):
for myself and my team. And we identified that the
two most important things were safety of our customers and
our employees and protection preservation of our brand and business.
Those two things the most important. Next, I think we realize, okay,
as we do these two things together, it was quite
obvious we'll have to take some very hard decisions, you know,
to protect ourselves. Um. So what other filters and values
(24:33):
that we will apply as a lens as we make
those hard decisions. So a few kind of emerged. One most.
You know, even if you do the hard things, we
must do it with compassion and heart and do to respect.
You can do tough things, but you can do them
in a very respectful fashion. We reminded ourselves of how
Panera actually thinks of ourselves. We think of ourselves as
(24:56):
one family, and you know, family family sort of sacrific
eises for each other. Is there for each other? And
the third mindset was, you know, let's not burn the furniture.
This this tool shall end, you know, so let's not
kind of overreact, you know this. And then finally, how
might we use this as a catalyst to become stronger? Right,
(25:19):
it's such a destructive event. We now have the permission
to actually accelerate all the changes that we were thinking
of doing over three years. We can do that in
three months, yes, because that's the snowball. But shaken, That's
what I said in the beginning, the snowball for shaking,
so so run over. You know, I agree with you,
and you don't know what to do. Sits still, but
then you collect yourself and you figure out you know,
(25:41):
that's what's interesting. You have to pick a lane and
do something. You have to pick a lane, do something
and actually have a mindset of I'm going to use
this as an opportunity to get better, right right. This
is where when I was talking before about sort of
being a little bit of a maverick and being an entrepreneur,
this is when you see what your team is made of.
Because often the machine is just moving and I'm sure
(26:04):
you're making great strides, but it's not usually that there's
so much action and so much hustle in a corporate
environment corporate corpse. You know, corporations move very slowly, like
a big cruise ship making a turn. But in this case,
you're talking about everybody really like kicking into high gear
and having to be hustlers during a pandemic And was
there how much of a hit did you take, like
(26:27):
from the beginning of the pandemic to now bouncing back?
What's the what's what? What's the aggregate? Like? How much
of it? Where are you now? Where were you? How
much of the e commerce and social media help? Like?
What what's the takeaway? First on the first piece that
you said you right. You know, organizations can slow down
the bigger they are, the more you know, and it
(26:47):
requires a lot of work to have the speed of
a startup. Right and Peta and Panetta, we have this
mindset of speed of a startup. We think in days,
we think in days, we're not thinking years out here.
So so I think very fortunate to have, you know,
that kind of a culture in the company. And as
you know, very often crisis creates a collaboration, which is
(27:09):
you know, which is like disproportionate. People come together in
ways that you would never expect. So I'm really fortunate
to have the team and the culture, and also our
franchise partners. By the way, our franchise partners on half
of our cafes and we work very much as one team,
one era, and they were also phenomenal through this entire event.
To your question on the business, where are we now?
(27:31):
So we totally we lost half of our business. Now
we are in positive territory over the last few months,
you know, we've recovered completely, and most of that is
essentially down to the fact that be pivoted, you know,
quickly off premise from sixty pre pandemic to post pandemic
off premise, off premise, I mean curbside and delivery and
(27:53):
drives throughout all the kind of stuff digital from of
her total revenue, to of her to to revenue and
are so as we have emerged, as we have emerged
fast forward. Today we're a stronger Panera. You know, We're
a stronger brand that is innovated, by the way, very fast.
There's another thing that happened to the pandemic apart from
(28:14):
what I mentioned. Imagine that we launched two new platforms.
I don't know if you've tried the flatbread pizza, but
we launched a totally new platform called Flatbread Pizzas, which
is pizza's done the Panera way think of it. We're
all sitting remote in zoom Land, don't have access to
(28:36):
our test kitchen, can't go out and taste any products.
And in October last year, we launched this mega new
platform which is quite complicated across the entire state, and
we are now the the fifteenth largest pizza company in
the US, you know, six months ago. So it's a
(28:56):
happy accident. I mean, I know, obviously the pan It
is tragic and we're not forgetting that. But I'm saying
you would have never realized of these things. I mean,
this is a happy accident. These are all of the
sort of things that you had to realize during unfortunate circumstances.
(29:24):
So do you think for people that are you know,
have small businesses entrepreneurs um that traditional marketing is not
where you should really be spending your time, energy and money,
that social media and e commerce is where it's at
that that for you as a company, are you still
spending money on traditional marketing? Are you you mentioned Oprah
(29:46):
and Deepak Chopra. Do spokespeople matter what matters the most,
what matters, what really moves the needle if you only
have a small budget. So I think for our listeners
who may have smaller businesses, I think it all comes
down to what is your proposition and who is your
target consumer? And then what is the most efficient way
(30:07):
to reach out to that target consumer in a way
that is very personal and in a way in which
you give that same message to that consumer multiple times
so that it regists registers. That's kind of the media strategy,
and it you know, varies from business to business. I
think we still believe in the power of h of
(30:29):
you know, traditional media. I think that's still very impactful.
We believe in that. However, we're spending more and more
of our budget into digital and e commerce because you know,
the I think the mobile phone, I think is the
media outlet for the future. And I think because you know,
(30:50):
as I say, energy equal to one, your consumer is
basically now one. And being able to microsegment an individual
consumer and to be a to reach out to that
consumer in a way that's not a intrusive, that engages
and entertains that particular customer, you have to think about
how you can do that, and I think there is
(31:11):
where digital, e commerce, social, et cetera. Can really score.
So I think I would say it depends on what
your business is, how much budget you have, and who
you're going after. But the general trend is more micro
micro micro. You know, let me really understand each and
every consumer that I have and serve them better than
(31:32):
anybody else. What about scaling? What's the most important thing
when you go from one thing that's somewhat successful, seems
to be a good idea and expanding in a thoughtful
way that's not going to blow blow you up, because
expansion is great, but it can also be a brand destroyer.
So I would say the overriding umbrella thought is discipline,
(31:57):
you know, and let me just expand on that. First,
to be disciplined, to get a very clear brand idea
that you have, an idea that is serving a real
need that exists that nobody else can serve better than you.
That's the most important thing. First off, is this something
(32:18):
unique that you're doing that nobody else can do better
than you? So that has to be a tick. Once
that is a tick, you move on to the second base,
which is around can I make money? And how do
I make money? Um, you know, what is my business
model in terms of my revenue and my costs and
how does that square up? And can I make the
kind of returns today? But also at scale? What will
(32:41):
it really take? An understanding and doing the maths is
very very important before you start running with the ball.
I've done that wrong. I did that wrong. Where you're
you know, you're planning as you go and and we
have to do a little of that to be we
have to we have to do a little building the
plane while flying. I'm still doing it, but you have
(33:02):
to be smart and be able to at least add
up the numbers as you're going or have people around you,
they can do that. You can't do that when you
work at a six billion dollar major company with locations
that can't work. You can't just fly by the seat
of your pants. But butting, entrepreneurs have to be a
little bit more running gun a little bit, Yeah, they
have to. So I think this is one step that
you know, very often people get so excited and emotionally
(33:25):
committed to that idea. Yes, they started running before they
have the discipline of you know, putting down the numbers.
You know. And these numbers, by the way, don't have
to be scary. I mean, they have to be an
articulation of fact, which is today it is this, more growth,
it could be this, you know, and so on and
so forth, your seat in trenches, because every business will
(33:48):
have like a step change trajectory. You know. The last
question is how do you how does get back? Well?
I think firstly, it's a very important part of who
I am and have been for many years. You know,
have a personal story. I lost two of my daughters
over the years, and that loss has really sort of
deepened my sense of compassion and desire to give back.
(34:10):
Uh In in my individual capacity, but also how to
use the companies of which I am a part of
as a force multiplier for good. You know. So that's
kind of the mindset with which I come. Um supernea
UM has in its heart core DNA is to be
good and do good. You know. It's it's a you
(34:33):
describe the brand like, it's kind of fits very naturally
with the quality of our ingredients and and the value
and ethos that we have that we will serve food
only that WEEO will serve to our own families. You know,
it's that type of our brand. So UM, I think
we have you know, signature programs UM such as end
of Day donation where we donate all our unsold bakery
(34:56):
and sweet good items every every day to more than
four thousand nonprofit NGOs worth about hunand and fifty million
dollars a year. You know, that's a standard signature program.
We have other fundraising efforts that we do. But the
two things that I'm most passionate about right now is
(35:18):
impacting global warming and climate change and diversity and inclusion.
Let me talk about both of those. I think on
climate change, as you know, it's a very serious probably
one of the biggest threats that we all face collectively,
and food production contributes to one third of greenhouse gas emissions.
(35:39):
You know, food production, fossil fuels, accept everybody understands, but
people really often don't get that connection of food production
and therefore I think it would be irresponsible for food
retail companies not to take that into account and to
do something. So what we have done is we've partnered
with the World Resources Institute and measured the carbon footprint
(36:02):
impact of a plate of food at Panera to identify
that forty of what we serve is what we call
cool foods or climate friendly, and we've labeled them that
in that in Panera. Now, so if you go into
open Era and you want to have a positive impact
in climate, you can eat what is labeled as school food,
you know, and and and we have a growing commitment
(36:24):
to as plant based, etcetera. So that's one aspect of impact.
The second one on diversity and inclusion is is a
deeply held personal value of mind that you know, we
should make Panera the world that we wish to see
because we have limited control on the world, but all
the control within Paneria. So why can't Panera be a
shining example of a world within Pania that is compassionate,
(36:48):
that is inclusive and respectful, that is tolerant, that is embracing,
whether it is differences in race, religion, you know, color, set,
your orientation, or any kind of difference. Why can't we
be a melting pot and embrace diversity and towards that end,
we have, you know, three pillars that we're thinking of.
(37:10):
One is kind of how can we have more representation
That kind of everybody does, and we're focusing more on
gender and race right now, so more representation. The second
is represent representation in impact positions, which means leadership, you know,
so not just representation, but impact positions representation. And the third,
(37:31):
which is right now a dream, which is how can
we create a program where we can have generational progress
for very talented and skilled um children from underprivileged backgrounds,
Because I really believe that success of the function of
ability and opportunity, and many of these children are very,
(37:52):
very skilled, but they never have the opportunity and Camponera
create that opportunity for those talented youngsters who are within
the Panea family right now and give them an accelerated
path of generational progress. It could be maybe ten families,
it could be maybe fifteen families, but you will transform
(38:13):
their lives forever, you know. So are those are a
few things appear if you're thinking of, well, this was
wonderful and so much takeaway, as almost as much takeaway
as we've had any interview. And I'm pleasantly surprised. So
that was amazing, pleasantly surprised. I have another surprise for you. Okay. Now,
we talked about fun, right, fun at work? So I'm
(38:36):
going to sing you a song. Okay? Is that okay? Sure? Perfect?
So you talked about, you know, how do people have fun?
Any show up as authentic self and there's too much
corporate blah blah blah. I just want to give you
a feel for what it's like to work at Banera,
where we're just having fun and being ourselves. So I
keep writing songs. I get inspired by Banera's renovations. This
(38:58):
song is on coffee. Okay, okay, the coffee subscription program.
Everybody deserves it. Great cup of coffee is coffee so
damn expensive, but never has great coffee. We will it's accessible.
(39:30):
We will make it accessible to everybody. That's that's amazing.
That's amazing. That's like when you know Adam Sandlers things
about Hanukkah, that's really great. It's like it's like good,
good and funny. Um, that's awesome. That was a great song.
What a great note to end up. Awesome, Thank you Bye.
(39:59):
I was really prized by this conversation. I have to
say I have different types of people on here because
I want to appeal to different types of people and
I want to have different conversations. But I'm really fascinated
by these big companies and I'm fascinated by the leaders
and these companies because many of you work in the
corporate space and don't want to feel like you have
to apologize for that, and like that means that you're
(40:19):
not really an entrepreneur, that you're not really a maverick,
that you don't really have serious, intense decisions to make
and ways to navigate this whole landscape. So, you know,
I thought that someone who's running such a massive, multibillion
dollars company might be a little dry, and that, you know,
the conversation might be not over our heads, but just
(40:41):
not really someplace where we would get amazing business advice.
I was shocked. I thought it was one of the
best conversations I've had to really get tactical and practical
strategic advice from someone who had to really make hard
decisions getting this new job right before a pan that
so you're taking over a multility about company right for
(41:02):
for a pandemic, you have to prove yourself and also
you have to react and just figure it out. So
I thought it was a great conversation. I'm interested to
hear what you think. Uh do remember to rate, review
and subscribe to appreciate it so much. Thank you. Just
(41:23):
b is hosted an executive produced by me Bethany Frankel.
Just Be as a production of be Real Productions and
I Heart Radio. Our managing producer is Fiona Smith and
our producer is Stephanie Sender. Our EP is Morgan Levoy.
To catch more moments from the show, follow us on
Instagram at Just Be with Bethany
Host
Bethenny Frankel
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