March 19, 2025 • 48 mins
In this insightful episode of Fast Casual Nation, host Paul Barron speaks with Charles Bililies, Founder and CEO of Souvla, about pioneering the "fast fine" category that blends counter service with full-service restaurant quality. Bililies shares how Souvla has maintained its core menu for 11 years while serving over a million meals annually across six locations, appealing to Gen Z through omnichannel flexibility and consistent quality. The discussion explores Souvla's deliberate growth strategy, its unique value proposition of offering 80% of full-service dining at 50% of the price, and the real estate challenges in today's market as the brand aims to expand to 10 Bay Area locations.
FastCasualEvolution #RestaurantInnovation #FoodServiceTrends
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Capital & Advisory: Are you a fast-casual restaurant startup or a technology innovator in the food service industry? Don't miss out on the opportunity to tap into decades of expertise. Reach out to Savor Capital & Advisory now to explore how their seasoned professionals can propel your business forward. Discover if you're eligible to leverage our unparalleled knowledge in food service branding and technology and take your venture to new heights.
Don't wait – amplify your voice or supercharge your startup's growth today with Savor's ecosystem of industry-leading platforms and advisory services. Visit https://www.savor.fm/capital-advisory
FastCasualEvolution #RestaurantInnovation #FoodServiceTrends
Get Your Podcast Now! Are you a hospitality or restaurant industry leader looking to amplify your voice and establish yourself as a thought leader? Look no further than SavorFM, the premier podcast platform designed exclusively for hospitality visionaries like you. Take the next step in your industry leadership journey – visit https://www.savor.fm/
Capital & Advisory: Are you a fast-casual restaurant startup or a technology innovator in the food service industry? Don't miss out on the opportunity to tap into decades of expertise. Reach out to Savor Capital & Advisory now to explore how their seasoned professionals can propel your business forward. Discover if you're eligible to leverage our unparalleled knowledge in food service branding and technology and take your venture to new heights.
Don't wait – amplify your voice or supercharge your startup's growth today with Savor's ecosystem of industry-leading platforms and advisory services. Visit https://www.savor.fm/capital-advisory
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
We are back here on Fast Casual Nation, the podcast
that started it all. Today I'm going to be flying
solo without my co host shere Candler, but that doesn't
matter because today we have one of I think one
of the best fast casual concepts in the country, and
that is Suvla coming in with me. Of course, it's
Charles Billillis, who is the CEO and founder over there.
Great to see you, how are you.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Always a pleasure to see you. Thank you so much
for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
My name is Paul Baron. As the early pioneer in
fast casual, I've seen the industry evolve from just a
few operators to the most sought after segment by consumers
around the world. Now we're planning to shape its future.
Taping to decades of my expertise identifying the emerging brands
and tech winners in the space. Saber Capital will be
(01:08):
fueling the next generation of fast casual innovation. So we
were kind of having, you know, old times prior to
the recording and when I go back, yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah, a while.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
Yeah, And what was the location that when I visited
San Francisco you had just opened it up?
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Was it? Hayes is our original location.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
That's the original location.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
It was a brand new one though.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
That's right, that's right, we had opened up.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
For those familiar with the city of San Francisco, we
had opened at that point.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
That was our fourth restaurant.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
That's on Chestnut Street, which is in the Marine District
of San Francisco.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Yeah, and if you guys have never been to a Suvla,
what I will tell you is this. This is one
of those concepts that the first time that I walked
in I'm showing some video on screen here. First of all,
I could not believe that it was a fast casual concept.
Uh and the idea of lower cost food at this
price point absolutely blew me away. And obviously, Charles, you
(02:10):
and your team do a fantastic job with soul. Tell
me what's new? What are you guys up to?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Yeah? Sure, I mean just to it's funny.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
So the video there is on our website, which we
you know, that was taken many years ago. But when
when the when obviously Subla was quite new and honestly
the format was quite new.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
We've we've positioned Souvlo.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
As they may mentioned, we're about to celebrate eleven years
in business next month. But I believe so it will
be the first in what we call the fast find category,
which is based which is you know, obviously this is
fast casual nation. Fast Line is is sort of exists
within the fast casual genre, but at more of the premium. Yes,
(02:55):
and really and really it's about combining the more traditional
fast casual model with my fine dining background. So you
have you have a you have a fast casual restaurant
where you still ordered the counter, but it looks and
acts and feels like a full service restaurant. And and now,
you know, a decade later, we're seeing many, many, many
of the of the souvla of which is really great.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Yeah, that's cool because back.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Then and still to this day, you know, I had
the belief that this is the way that people.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
Want to eat, you know now where whereas where it's
they want quality, they want you know, relative low costs,
they want obviously high value, but they also want the
freedom and flexibility to interact with the restaurant and and
the brand overall in many ways.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Well, and I think the key here is is that
we have seen so much growth in fast casual over
the last five years, and a lot of it has
been on the what I call the upper tier, much
like what you're talking about, that fine casual experience. We've
seen it here in Miami where we're located, also seen
a lot going on in New York, which at one
time Fast Casual had almost vacated New York, But we
(04:06):
started to see a little bit of resurgence here in
the last eighteen months, So I think it's coming back.
Now here's my question to you, and I want because
obviously today's topic is going to be talking about gen
Z and their attraction to this particular category that is
so dynamic. And when I get a chance to visit
almost all of the restaurants that we cover here on
the show, the one thing that I have seen nationwide
(04:29):
is what appears to be a demographic shift. But that
being said, when I was at your restaurant six and
seven years ago, you were already there, You had already
kind of achieved that connection to a different demographic. First
of all, how's it going now with that demographic when
you look at gen Z and millennials, and why do
(04:52):
you think the attraction is so strong?
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Now, I'll take the second question.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
First, I think that it's to my earlier point, it's
about having the flexibility within that restaurant and that restaurant brand.
Subla has almost since it's it's very very beginning been
in an omni channel business. So even you know, back
in the day, when you think about ten years ago,
(05:18):
in a more traditional fast casual setup, this is before
delivery was as widespread as it is now.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
There were no apps, there was very little online order.
You had to go.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
When you think about you know, when you talk about
New York City and and those brands, you know, vacating,
you had to go, and you had to wait in line,
and it was this sort of serve you know, this
this make line and you kind of like get your train,
you're in, you're out.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
It was it was it was very.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
In person, sort of manual right bye bye. By nature
of starting here in the Bay Area, we just naturally
end up at the at the tip of the sphere
with all things food and tech and then and are
able to integrate those things in a way that feels
very natural. So we were very early on in online ordering.
(06:03):
We were amongst the first to work with companies that
obviously are now very well known like door Dash and Caviat.
So all of those things have been a part of
our DNA for a very very long time, and of course,
to your point, all of those things have become very
much a part of gen Z's sort of daily life.
(06:23):
I think I think the I think the the second
part of it is is just how approachable Suvla is
to basically anyone, right. You know, the restaurants are open
seven days a week. They're opened straight through from lunch
all the way through dinner. You don't need to make reservations,
you don't need to. You can come alone and feel
(06:44):
comfortable dining solo. You can come with you know, a
friend or a partner or a group of people. You
can order in person to dine in or take to go.
You can order online and pay ahead and just come
and grab your food from our sidewalk facing pickup window.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
You can order delivery.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
I think the really really cool thing and and probably
one of the sweetest parts of the of the Subla
story over the many years, was just before COVID, we
we sort of started getting into the wedding business. And
that was not by intent, but it's because But it's
because the Sublo had been a place for so many,
so many people where they went on their first date
(07:23):
at Suvla. They met in line at Suvla. We actually
had someone proposed to his now wife at Suvla. So
we would get these inbound emails saying, hey, listen, like
we want to kind of complete the circle, you know,
would you cater our wedding?
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Subla has been has been a part.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
Of our uh relationship, you know, from from the very
very beginning, so we've we've actually catered a couple of
weddings on that account. I think the interesting thing here
we are twenty twenty five sort of you know, looking forward,
you know we we at Subla, are you know, really
trying to maintain you know, everything that got us here
(08:02):
at quality, consistency value, being able to be the omni channel,
to make sure that it's we want to make it
as easy for people to order and get souplot you know,
to where they are by any means. What's the big
shift for us in the last few years. And this
(08:23):
is kind of referring more to my generation. I'm forty two,
so the elder millennial I believe we are referred to
at this point. I still think umbridge a little bit
with that with that classification, because I do remember our
life before before cell phones and everything, and I know
how to use a roadary phone. No, what's been interesting
(08:46):
to see is the natural evolution of a customer's life.
And when you think about over over ten years, people
that were dining with us, you know, back in twenty fourteen,
fifteen sixteen, twenty thirty something young single, you know, living
in the city, generally working in you know, for startups.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
I'm overly generalizing here, of course.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
But but when you think about these people now, you know,
they're generally married, they've started families, they are are in
a place where they probably it doesn't make as much
sense for them to live in a in a city,
so they started to migrate out to some of the
(09:31):
surrounding areas. So coming out of COVID, you know, we were,
you know, pre COVID, we were getting ready to go
to New York. We were like, let's go bring through
the to New York. This has worked well here. We
want to be you know, subil is an urban neighborhood brand.
Coming out of COVID, you know, we obviously didn't go
to New York. We we knew that we lost a
(09:54):
lot of our core clientele through just all the data
that we had, but we realized in digging into the
sort of demo data and sales data and things like
that they didn't go that far.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
They actually stayed within the Bay Area.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
And we get countless emails every week, please open a
sup here, Please open a souple here.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Sure we and we had for.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
A long time UH resisted going to some of these
outlying markets like a Palo Alto or a Walnut Creek.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Or uh Marine, which is where our six.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Restaurant is now, because but now we've sort of realized that, like,
we need to be bringing students to these people. These
are some of our earliest and biggest customers and they
just miss having Sulo because they now no longer live
in the in the neighborhood where there was a Souvlo,
or they no longer have to commute to an office
that was near one of our one of our restaurants.
(10:47):
So it's like, okay, how do we how do we
bring Subla to them? So that's really how we're kind
of thinking about things moving forward right now.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Well, I think the see the key thing that we've
seen with gen Z is this trans position obviously with millennials,
but also gen Z. It has been unique because it
has not been a one for one, meaning some restaurant
brands that were very prolific in the millennial audience didn't
necessarily pick up the gen Z audience, and you guys
(11:16):
have been one of those that have been able to
spread between those two demographics. And I think it shows
up a lot with it if you look at the
menu transition. This is a quick article from Fastcasual dot com.
Gen Z driving twenty twenty five casual menu trends and
also are Fast Casual menu trends, but I think they're
driving trends across the entire food space when you look
(11:39):
at what you guys are doing. First of all, have
you done anything recently that has moved away from maybe
the traditional menu that at least I remember, you know,
seven eight years ago. Have you guys started to expand
out that on that or is it pretty much the
same core menu.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
I'll be honestbo, our menu hasn't changed since you were
last in one of our restaurants.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
So if it works, don't mess with it.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
Well, you know it is that.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
I think that it is one of those things with
Soublo because of the reputation that we have built with
the brand over over a decade now, people actually really
really love They love Supler for many reasons, but one
of them is the fact that it doesn't change and
that it is it is always there.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
It is a it is a constant.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
I sort of joke that like that you know now
when you when you move to to a city like SF,
it's like you've got you know, water power, internet, souvla.
I mean it, it's like it sort of functions in
that way where it's like if there's ever a day
where it's like there's some sort of an outage or
whatever it is, it's like people freak out. It's almost
(12:44):
like if our if our internet went down right now,
we would be panicking, you know. If you know, it's
rare that that that sublas are closed, but if there
was something where we had to close the restaurant for
maintenance or whatever it is, it becomes this huge sort
of panic. So having said that, you know, one of
the things that we are looking at for this year
is to sort of get get into the sort of
(13:06):
you know what we refer to in the industry as
the the the lt O game. And so we're and
so we're working on some some menu items that will
sort of be sort of introduced for for limited periods
of time again just to kind of like you know,
keep you know, ten years in, you know, we're we're very,
very fortunate to have a brands as strong and as
(13:27):
and has loved as the as the Supler brand, but
also recognizing the fact that you know, ten years in,
there's a lot of similar operations to us locally, you know,
whereas when we first started it was a very unique,
unusual concept and format and things like that, and now
we're just seeing a lot of I don't want to
call them copycats but because they're not, but they're obviously,
(13:48):
you know, adapting our formats.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
So we want to continue to keep top of mind.
So there wasn't some of these yeah things are pig
our list.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
I think there was a handful of concepts there in
San Francisco that had really kind of leveraged up to
your point. But back to the menu thing, and before
I get to that, is one thing about Suvla and
now that I know, you know, you guys have pretty
much stayed true to what the brand's core is. That's
something that I think is a differentiator probably in most
(14:18):
light where you guys have elevated the quality of the
product so much so that it's required so much to
leap to it in terms of competition, I'm curious. When
I was out there on that trip, I visited three
different concepts and they're all I believe they're all still operating.
One was bun Me Denise Trand I think she just
(14:40):
is still moving along in San Francisco.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
Yeah, she just she just opened up in in SFO
and I believe she's operating that herself. It is, I mean,
it is absolutely crushing it. It's my it's my go
to spot. Whenever I love it, I'm flying in and out.
I mean, she's in a really really good job with that.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
With that, how about how about Rome Artisan? Are they
still around? Did they make it?
Speaker 3 (15:02):
Rose Room still going, Rum still going? Josh A Zella
is a good friend of mine. They just opened up
actually fairly close to us in Marine over in the
town over the Corbu town of Country, I think, or
shopping center or something like that.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
All three of those.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Yeah, it was like a Triplet's in San Francisco in
terms of really high quality, fast casuals that we're setting
the stage and then of course, we saw a lot
of movement into what you're talking about, which is kind
of the competitive layer where they started to see the
success of think of brands like you really going in
that direction and exposing some of the weaknesses of fast casual.
(15:41):
To me, I see that there are some weaknesses in
the category right now, and it's usually on the down side,
meaning the side that's trying to become a little bit
closer to quick serf, usually through price, maybe through some
menu selections, possibly implementing drive through, or you know, trying
to to do some things that are very q r
(16:02):
qs r ask. Not that that's a bad thing, but
I just think customers are trying to delineate because most
of the time fast casual has elevated up to almost
compete with casual dining. When you when you look at that, Charles,
and especially in the gen Z crowd, because price is
a big point and you guys kind of walk that
(16:23):
very fine line between casual dining and true fast casual.
How have you been able to hold that line first?
And do you feel like you are garnering customers from
upstream or downstream that are trading up Where do you
feel like you get the most bang for that, I think.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
We're Yeah, so I think I think to answer your question,
I mean a lot of that just lies with me
and just and just and maybe I'm just stubborn, but
it's just like, this is the vision, this is the
this is what we do.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
And then there are certain things that we just that
we just don't do, you know.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
And so you know, and I always I often reference
this of like, you know, we always think of our
restaurants whenever we're integrating something into it, whether it's you know,
a menu item or a change revolution or a design
or touch point or anything like that. You know, we
always we always ask ourself the questions, is it's nice
enough that I could that I can bring a date here?
Speaker 2 (17:16):
And I think that's that's that's one of the big
things that really sets us apart. You know.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
People see they look at the super the menu and
they're like, oh, this is like this is a fast
casual lunch. You guys must do a big lunch. Like actually,
we do more business in the evenings than we do
during the day. You know, these are these restaurants. To
my earlier point about weddings, these are nice enough that
you can bring a date too, And so I think
and which I think is also what helps us resonate
with the sort of gen Z crowd because you get
(17:43):
you get basically eighty percent of the full service, you know,
mid tier sort of restaurant dining experience at fifty percent
of the price.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
And so and when I mean think about think about Paul,
when you and I were were that age one time,
we were like, you know, generally, you know, money is
is is.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Well, you also just don't have as much of it,
you know.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
And I think and I and I and I and
I think today in today's day and age, where we are,
you know, the cost of you know, for my wife
and I had to go out to eat at even
sort of like a mid tier full service restaurant, nothing
super fancy, and even you're talking about like you know,
an entry level bottle, bottle of wine, maybe sharing app,
maybe even share an entre, you're still looking at one hundred,
(18:31):
one hundred and fifty bucks. You know, you could you
could go and do that at soup Lab, same stuff
and do it for sixty you know. And so so
I think that's that's also just you know a big
part of it too.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
It is we we do.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
We do bump into sort of some some and especially
after we opened our marine shop, people walk in and
they even though the counter is right at the front door,
they walk in.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
And they sit down and then they're like, well, no
one's come to my table, where's the where's where's the surf?
Speaker 1 (19:05):
From there, you go, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
I'm a little a little a little too nice maybe
in exactly yeah, respect because you think that you're in
a full service restaurant.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
It's funny. I remember the experience vividly, and it's one
of those that you know, it's it's rare. I've been
in thousands of fast casual concepts and and Suvla is
one that I would I would definitely put it in
the top ten in terms of just memory of food,
the experience of just the buzz of the restaurant, the
theme that you guys have going in terms of the
(19:35):
Greek theme, which I think is dead on with right now,
both from a diet standpoint, you know, just in how
we're eating these days, but also I think what we've
seen in the space, especially in fast casual, that has
leaned a little bit more toward healthy but yet still
at the same time, flavorful and just you know, super
(19:55):
great in terms of the way that menus are constructed
these days. I want to take make a break real
quick and mention our partner, but I want to we're
going to get back and we're going to I want
to talk to you about kind of the magic sauce
of where you guys think this market's going, because especially
in fine casual, because this is maybe this is a
new era that could be evolving in a big way.
(20:19):
So let's cut to our partner here. If you guys,
of course, are not at the Fast Casual Summit, this
is a place that you've got to go to. And
of course this is now going on it's twentieth year
and it is the industry event that shapes the future
of fast casual. It's led, obviously by our co host
Charic Canceler and her team over at NetWorld Media Group.
(20:41):
They do a fantastic job at this. We will actually
be airing our podcast from this event this year, So
make sure and jump over to Fastcasual dot com and
go to Fastcasual Summit dot com if you want to
just register and start checking out the agenda. It's going
to be a big one this year as well, and
we'll get back to the show. All right, So I'm
back here with Charles Billillison. We are talking about Suvla
(21:04):
and the future of maybe fine casual right now. Charles,
when you look at the category of upscale fast casual
fine casual and the number of brands that have now
started to come into the space nationwide, do you think
this is a trend that maybe is just fast casual
three point zero the next generation of it.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Well, I mean, first of all, I want to thank
you for your kind words, uh, just prior to the
break there about you know, you obviously travel the world
or and travel the country at least and really focus
on this on this format.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
So to have Subla live in your mind in that way,
it's a good one. Really, really really really means a lot,
it does.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
I mean, this is something that we've been you know,
that I've been working on for well beyond the the
eleven years that we've that we've been in business. So
I just want to thank you for that. No, I
think that it's my earlier point and we we we
we referred to Subla as fast fine. I think you
can call it whatever you want. That's just the name
that stuck with us. But people are saying find casual
(22:04):
fast fine. You know, I don't disagree with the notion
of the of the you know, this potentially becoming fast
casual three point h I think you're starting to see
it a little bit more with some of the bigger.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Players out there.
Speaker 3 (22:19):
I think, I think the the biggest challenge and something
that that you know, we at Subla, you know, spend
an awful lot of our time on is the is
the service and hospitality side of things and also just
the the the total guest experience and really thinking about
all of the other you know, service centers and touch points,
(22:40):
whether it's you know, the lighting or the candles on
the table in the evening, or you know the artwork
or how you're rated, or you know, flatware plate where
we just went through a big f F and sort
of you know, switch up in terms of just you know,
leveling up you know some of some of those items
as well. All of that stuff matters. I think it
probably gets a little more challenging at you know, at
(23:03):
a at a national scale. You know, we we right
now are still in one market within with six restaurants,
but that that becomes you know, the bigger, the bigger
sort of challenge. But yeah, I listen, I think that
you know, to my point, you know, twelve years ago
in terms of you know, this is this is how
people want to eat moving forward, I think that that
(23:26):
has very much, you know, played itself out. And like
I said, we we've been at the at the tip
of this sphere for quite some time.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
But we are not resting on our on our laurels.
Speaker 3 (23:34):
So we're always looking at at opportunities to you know,
do more, do better, you know, you know, make things,
you know, make the make the overall experience for the guests,
you know, memorable, like you're like your first signing experience
with us whatever, seventy eight years ago.
Speaker 2 (23:52):
So and that's and there are so many little things.
I think.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
The the thing that is that always is I always
sort of laugh about, is we get a lot of
inbound whether it's for people that want to you know,
that are asking us to franchise, or people that want
to investor you know, why can't you open here, here, here, here, here.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
These are very.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
These are very people intensive businesses, and these are actually
very complicated businesses.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
And restaurants to run.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
People see a menu with four items on it. You know,
the menu at first glance looks very very minimalist, in
which in which in many ways it is. But I
think for those in the in the in the food space,
you know, the the simpler a dish looks on plate,
you know, the the harder it is to actually execute
(24:37):
because you're because you're no longer distracted by a million
different things.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
It's crazy. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
So well, the quality and I think the flexibility of
what you guys have brought, you know, that's right, And
that's my question is do you think it can scale?
Do you think we can get to a brand like
Souvla that could have fifty units, maybe we don't see
thousands like what Kava is trying to do, But Kava
kind of was breed from that that ilk, you know,
very high quality, chef driven. Now they're going after, you know,
(25:06):
hundreds of units. And what is your thought on that
in terms of growth in this this area?
Speaker 2 (25:12):
I mean two things.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
One to your earlier point, in terms of the food itself,
Greek cuisine or the or the or the broader category
is something that obviously has been around for uh thousands
of years, but is very much a testament just as
much then as it is now to how people want
(25:33):
to eat these This is this is wholesome healthy food.
When you look at the super menu, it's a lot
of lean protein, it's a lot of vegetables, it's a
lot of whole foods.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
These are these are These are.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
Dishes that you want to and can eat multiple times
a week. You know, we have guests that dine with us.
You know, yeah, I have six days a week. You know,
I myself eat soup labe, you know, basically on a
daily basis. You know, you you want to and you
can eat this and you feel good eating it.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Also, are the menu.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
The way that it's set up, there's a lot of
freedom and flexibility. It may look very rapid, but because
we have these dishes that have these sort of set
menusets with them, they go on with the protein. We
can adapt to most people's preferences. So if you're not
eating dairy, or if you're not if you're not eating meat,
we have fed options. You know, if we can, we
can omit certain things so so so we can tailor
(26:31):
those dishes. I think as far as scale goes, one
of the great things about about SUVLA and and and
the category overall is that there's no regional bias behind it.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
You know, I am I am a proud Greek.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
Uh American and Subla is obviously a California, Northern California brand.
But it's unlike a pizza or barbecue or some of
these other categories that have these regional biases to them.
There is no regional bias to sufl you know, if
you were to probably fight as California Greek, that can
(27:06):
translate to any any any major market. And I think
also just going back to you know, the volume and
and that and that, you know the fact that there's
this quite frankly love affair with our with our menu,
you know, with our with our guests. They're they're like,
you know, obsessed over whether it's our frozen Greek yogurt
or you know, traditional egg lemon soup. Things like that.
(27:28):
People want to be you know, they're like creating it
and they and they want to and can have it
many days a week. The other the other, you know,
part to the to the format is just the overall
economic and sort of business model. Like Suvla served Sula
as a as a company last year served just over
a million meals out of six restaurants, So we obviously
(27:48):
do a lot of volume. And the fact that this
is an om channel business means that you know, you
get the same great food, you know, whether you're dining in,
you're taking to go, you're having it delivered, you're ordering
it online, and you're having it catered. So everything is
really designed, you know, to be done at scale. So
I think the hardest part with retuct is are are
(28:11):
scaling is it? Like I may mentioned earlier, it's a
very people intensive business.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
So it's it's it's real estate and it's people first
and foremost.
Speaker 3 (28:21):
And you know, once we have those things locked, everything
else kind of falls into place. But we are very
very selective about where we go, about the about the
physical space, about where it actually is inside of a
city or a town.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
And then of course you know, we spend a tremendous
amount of our time and our resources, uh, you know,
developing you know, our our leaders, in our in our
in our team members.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Well, and I think you you hit on so many
good things there, but you didn't answer my question, and
that is scale. Yes, I love the The.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
The short answer is yes. The longer answer is yes.
But it will It will definitely take time to do
it right. I think you and I have both seen
over the years a lot of these fast castual brands,
you know, raise tremendous amounts of money, scale very very quickly,
(29:14):
and then.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Just say the words, well, listen, you're pretty still around.
They're doing they're doing great.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
I'm just saying that traded they have a market cap
of many billions of dollars.
Speaker 2 (29:25):
You know.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
It's like they're and they're and they're and they're and
they're growing, you know, and and we and we and
we like those guys. I've known Nick for for a
long time. They may not be profitable, but they've definitely
built something that's still around. My My point is, you know,
we we don't follow the traditional playbook of you know,
raising from venture or private equity, which you.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Know comes you know, tons of money and headlines, but
comes with this, with this, with this unrealistic pressure to grow,
you know.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
So you know it's like to your point, yes it can,
Well that could it scale to fifty units in two years?
Speaker 2 (30:02):
No? Could it scale the fifty units in ten years? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (30:05):
Probably, you know, to do it right and you need
a lot of things, but time is one of the
biggest ones, because yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Yeah, I think you're heading on the right direction in
terms of just that the potential of scaling and how
scaling is going to work for brands like you guys.
If you get up to fifty units, first of all,
the ability just because of the AUV size and throughput
that you guys have been able to do that in
itself is going to be like one hundred store chain
by itself by most fast casual standards. So I would
(30:36):
agree with you there, and you look at just the
concept of being able to deliver at this level of high,
super high quality, ridiculous experience. That's the thing I'm curious
about because when I started in fast casual, it was
you could tell the differences. Most of them were California brands.
(30:57):
You know, if you go back to Greg dollar Hyde
and what Baja Fresh was doing, you look at the
early stages of all those guys, they were really separating
between QSR and I felt like that that most of
fast casual had lost its way kind of trying to
dumb it down to get to the point where they
could scale. And there's only a few founders guys like
yourself that have stayed with the ideas maybe there's something
(31:20):
bigger here, you know, in terms of crossing over a
multitude of categories. And now I think maybe the demographic
of gen Z may appreciate this differently than the previous
generations that have come before. So that's the thing I'm
going to as are we maybe at the edge of
a boom going forward?
Speaker 2 (31:42):
I would tend to agree.
Speaker 3 (31:43):
It's funny as you were, as you mentioned that, I
was thinking a little bit about you mentioned earlier about
people trading down or trading up the consumer, and I think,
what's interesting, and again we're able to sort of see
this through a different lens, just based off of being
in Northern California, which is, you know, in many ways
a bubble and bubble in a bubble, So you know,
you want to talk about tip of the sphere, it's
tip of the sphere in a different way in terms
(32:05):
of like oftentimes what happens here from a socio economic
standpoint makes its way throughout the rest of the country.
So I was thinking a little bit about the when
you think about a gen Z customer trading up from
a from a QSR, because now in California with the
Fast Act you know the you know, for for a
(32:26):
QSR you know worker, it's twenty dollars an hour. Therefore,
your your value meal is now approaching the cost of
or is probably just as much as a you know,
a sandwich or salad from from asuvla.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
Now for the same basically the same.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
Amount of money, you get a much higher quality product
that's you know, made fresh, that's good for you, that
you feel good eating, and you get to do it
in a wonderful restaurant space or obviously from your house
or your office or whatever. And then on the on
the flip side, you know, when I mentioned, you know,
(33:04):
just the the general check average of of a you know,
entry level, mid tier, full service restaurant, it's like, well,
you can only afford to do that several times a week,
you know.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
For it's you know, my wife always jokes whenever we
go out to eat, I'll look at it. I'll look
at the menu.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
I'll look at like the sides, and there'll be like
a vegetable side at this restaurant and it'll be fifteen bucks,
and I'll.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Be like, that's a that's a super a super chicken
sandwich right here.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Fight for my side of broccoli now and just like
you know, so, so there's so and listen, I think
we all know why that is what it what it
needs to be in those types of restaurants.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
But but but in Sula, it doesn't need it doesn't
need to.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
Be like yeah, you know, well, value is going to win,
the service win is going to win. And I think
these these consumers are starting to understand that because there's
really three things of whether it is fast, casual three
point zero, or it's you know, kind of this evolution
of what we'll see and find casual is that if
(34:05):
you've got super high quality, which you guys check, you
know you've got good value versus that quality check, and
then you have something that is that X factor. Usually
it's going to be either on the healthy side or
on the flavor side, and you guys kind of mix
into both of those. So I'm I'm very intrigued that
you know, Subla's growth pattern might be, uh set for
(34:28):
Are you prepared for growth? Do you want to grow?
What's your what's your current company culture?
Speaker 2 (34:33):
We are we are set for growth.
Speaker 3 (34:35):
We are prepared for growth with with respect to the
team that we have in place here. So there's seven
of us that oversee all of the restaurants.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
All of our sort.
Speaker 3 (34:46):
Of quote unquote services are in house, so finance, HR operations,
you know, very very little is outsourced so so and
and you know our ops team is you know, are
in our restaurants every day. Is a very very hands
on company. Both myself and Tony who's our chef and
part of the business, are very hands on people. We
(35:07):
are very present with that. My focus these days is
more on the growth side of things and really scouting
real estate and and uh negotiating deals and looking for
opportunities for for the brand.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
I think the differentiating.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Factor is is that we don't have any outside funding.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
There's no it's a huge fund is huge.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
It's huge, So there's no venture, there's no private equity.
We do not franchise, which basically allows us to have
allows us to have.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Total control of what we do.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
And we don't have any and we don't have any
external pressure to sign the least that we don't want
to sign, or to hire a person that don' want
to hire, or to move into a market that we
don't feel comfortable in. You know, we we we spend
most of our time turning down opportunities and then we'll
also looking for you know, the right the right ones,
and so you know that obviously slows down the pace
(36:07):
of growth.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
I mean, access to capital is not much of an
issue for us, but.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
We when when it when when it does come time
to build out restaurants, but we are but it does
slow it down with with respect to you know, how
many we could open at at at a given time.
We like to do a restaurant a year. That's generally
the pace that we prefer. Obviously, COVID, you know, kind
of through a wrench in that for for a little bit,
but we got back onto it. We're a little behind
(36:32):
right now and that we're we haven't found the right
piece of real estate locally here for us, for for
our seventh restaurant. It also is a little challenging when
you're trying to to compete with larger brands like a
Sweet Green or a Pavo or you know, any of
those brands where you know, we'll look at well, we'll
look at deals, you know, and we'll look at some
of these leases and we'll run the numbers and it's like, well,
(36:52):
this doesn't make any financial sense. And for us, you know,
our restaurants. Our restaurants are all profitable. They've always been profitable, thankfully,
with the exception of twenty twenty. But they just they
just they function like old school businesses and the fact
that they need to make money, right because if they don't.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
We would have money.
Speaker 3 (37:10):
So I know, I know, it's so crazy, this notion
of like a business need to be profitable.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
I mean, I'm very very important, you know.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
Very very fortunate that the businesses have been profitable since
you know, the earliest of of of days. Those that
had the ability to invest in in our in our
first few restaurants, you know, the first three we did
with some outside uh individuals, and then the second three
we've done ourselves. So the ones that that did have
the opportunity to get in it did well. The first
(37:39):
restaurant I think beat the S and P in ten years,
so as far as a return on capital. So but again,
you know, this is one of those things where when
you talk about secret sauce, you know, real estate plays
are really really big part of that.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
I've been a big you know, I've always.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
Felt really strongly about doing you know, the hard work
and on real estate, walking away from things that don't
make that, don't check all the boxes. I think depending
on the market, you know, or neighborhood, there's a big
difference between you know what, what block you're on, what
side of the block you're on, all of those things.
It's not as it's not as easy to people like, oh,
(38:18):
you just open up over here, it'll be fine.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
It's like it's not that easy, you know.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Okay, I'm going to save one question for you when
we come back here from our break, and uh, it's
going to be a good on because it's gonna be
talking about real estate. But we're going to get get
into our our partner here. If you guys are not aware,
Saver pivoted our business about a year ago and we
are still our thought leadership platform on podcasting. But Savior
(38:42):
Capital Advisory was launched and we have dedicated now a
group of advisors and funds into early stage, fast casual
much like what we're talking with Suvla and Charles, but
we're looking for those operators and also tech companies that
are looking to maybe level up. And again we're a
different kind of capital and advisory group. Go over to
(39:03):
Saver at dot FM. You can learn a little bit
more about it just over on our website click services
and you can pull down all of that good stuff.
Another thing that we have going on that you guys
may not be aware of is Fast Casual front Runners. Now,
this is an event that we're going to be hosting
that is going to be a mini series of fast
casual concepts growing in the US. We're going to pick
(39:26):
a winner and then give them a funding and advisory package.
We'll be partnered with a special partner. We'll talk about
those guys here pretty soon.
Speaker 2 (39:35):
So check that.
Speaker 1 (39:36):
All out over at Saverre dot FM. Back to the show,
all right, My last question to you, Charles is this,
let's get into real estate because this, to me is
like the potential for market to be maybe somewhat depressed
now is And I know you were around and watched
(39:57):
the industry in two thousand and eight where we saw
really the birth of fastca I think yes, that was
really the core birth. It had been around obviously for
much longer, but that's when we saw the explosion. Are
we nearing a potential real estate opportunity for fast casual growth?
What you're seeing it out there yet? In in San
(40:17):
Francisco or in maybe some of the surrounding markets.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
I think it's interesting because I would say I have answer.
I have both a yes and a no answer to that.
I think yes. I think yes.
Speaker 3 (40:32):
If you are an emerging brand that is not as
risk averse right now, you have an opportunity to get
into some downtown areas like here where I am in
in uh San Francisco, which obviously has you know, had
(40:54):
you know, this is obviously public knowledge.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
I would say, the.
Speaker 3 (40:56):
Slowest you know, bounce back from from COVID, so you're
able to kind of you know, there are plenty of
office buildings and landlords that are are desperate for quality
operators that are willing to extend you know, pretty great deals.
You know, I know some deals that have gotten done downtown,
you know where it's like free rent for the first.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
Year or percentage only or things along those lines.
Speaker 3 (41:20):
Now, I think that's that's really really great for a
for an upstart, you know, emerging brand. I think it
gets a little bit trickier for for you know, say
a brand like Soulo, where you know, these have to
spin up pretty quickly.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
We don't have the you know, the.
Speaker 3 (41:40):
Bandwidth to kind of tolerate, you know, this, you know,
whenever people are going to come.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Back to the office.
Speaker 3 (41:44):
So I think there are some deals to be done
in some of those areas. And whether they're in cities
you know, like here where there's were you know, uh,
we're trying to get everyone back in the office still,
or maybe some larger projects that are there coming online
that want to be able to sort of secure the
office tenant because they have X, Y Z yeah, best
(42:07):
casual fast find whatever restaurant brand in their in their building.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
You know.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
I think I think the I think the biggest shift
is is, you know, between office and retail is they've
realized now the power of high quality F and B
offerings and so and so and so that becomes the
lore to get you know, the other retail tenant to
come in, or to get the large office tenant to
(42:31):
go upstairs or all of those things.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
So that's the guest answer to the question.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
The no answer the question, at least from where I am,
is you know some of these so so pre covid
uh suburbs.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Were not cool. We're not hot. No one wanted to
be there as you No, I'm just saying broadly, you know,
and if you and.
Speaker 3 (42:49):
You and if you had asked me obviously you know,
twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, I would have said, no, I am,
We're going to We're going to Manhattan, We're going to La,
We're going to you know, all those, all those places
since to my earlier point, you know, because of COVID,
because people didn't have to commute into the office, or
they've moved out of these cities and they're and they're
(43:10):
living in these you know very you know, I would
say wealthy.
Speaker 2 (43:16):
Areas. They this consumer.
Speaker 3 (43:20):
Wants, craves, demands and can afford high quality food and
beverage right at any price point, whether it's you know
Asubla or you know, a high quality full service operator
that they just those are markets that just have never
really been serviced by by those brands before. And so Marin,
(43:40):
you know where we opened up is a is a
great example where we're in a complex there called the
Marine Country Mark, and we're surrounded by very high quality
both food and beverage.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
And fashion brands.
Speaker 3 (43:50):
And so now it's like, why why would I need
to live in San Francisco or a city where I
can live in Marin and I can go and net
SUVLA and shop at James Purse or Goop or you know,
and then and then also bring the kids to Shakeshack
and everything else like that.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
You've gotten all there. So what's what's interesting back in the.
Speaker 3 (44:07):
Real estate front is that there's now a demand for
all these brands, whether they're food and beverage or retail,
they want to get into these markets.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
And it's just driven rents through the roof.
Speaker 3 (44:20):
You know, and so and so and so we're looking
at deals, you know in some of these you know,
high streets of these of these suburbs, and you know
these are at least rates that are higher than our
pre COVID San Francisco leases.
Speaker 2 (44:33):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
So you know, it gets it gets challenging because from
our end, we want to do more here. We have
where we're resourced to do it, We have the team
that wants to do it, and we want to We
want to get up to you know, say call it
ten units here in the Bay Area because we know
that we can you know, we have the infrastructure to.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Handle that here.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
It's really coming. It's really just finding the right spaces
that meet our needs that also have landlords that are
that want to support you know, a business like Superland
are willing to be fair with their with their leases
because from our end, you know, we've got a very
very savvy back office over here, so you know, we
look at an l all I we run those numbers.
Speaker 2 (45:11):
We can very quickly determine if the landlord is making
more money and this sort of deal than we are.
Speaker 3 (45:17):
And we're not in the business of you know, landlords
you know, making more money than we are.
Speaker 2 (45:21):
You know, so.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
Unless they're unless they're building the whole thing out. And
quite frankly, you know, when you when you do that,
when you do that, when you do that math, oftentimes
that that costs capital is more expensive than it is
to borrow from a bank or to you know, private
funding or you know, any of those things. So it's
a it's a it's a very very viewanced. It's it's
(45:45):
very it's it's very hit, it's very hit or miss,
you know. I think that I think there's a big
opportunity for brands in this space, Super included, not that
we have anything that we're actually looking at, but I
think there's a big opportunity to partner with you know,
all larger operation, you know, whether it's a.
Speaker 2 (46:04):
Hotel group, or you know, some other sort.
Speaker 3 (46:06):
Of retail uh developer that sees the value in having
a souvla or a soupla of in their complex or
in the lobby of their hotel or any of those
things that are able to provide more resources, whether it's capital,
whether it's the actual infrastructure, because you know, unfortunately the
(46:26):
cost of building these restaurants is almost doubled since COVID,
you know so, and you know, all things.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Remaining equal, that means, you know, the payback on that.
Speaker 3 (46:36):
Investment has now effectively doubled, you know so, So there
are opportunities I think that that exists, especially in some
of these pricey cities, to find to kind of do
almost like a like a joint venture. I think it's
I mean, I think it's also potentially where where this
is going as well.
Speaker 1 (46:55):
Listen, it has been so good catching up with you
and what you guys are doing out there. We're we're
going to try to get on as you saw in
the front Runner series, We're going to be doing a
whole mini series on some of the top fast casuals nationwide.
So it would be good to get back into San
Francisco and maybe pick up new a new brand, but
if you do, if I am back there, I'm definitely
(47:15):
going to be visiting Sublas. So Charles has been great
having you on the show. Thanks so much for stopping
in today.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
Paul, thank you so much. Always am plu here.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
You bet all right. Last up, of course, if you
guys are not tuned in to our YouTube channel, make
sure and check out Savor dot Fm. You can just
jump over to our website. You can also visit Fastcasual
dot com, our show partner on this Visit the YouTube
channel because we are now nearing two hundred thousand subscribers
(47:44):
and over one point one million viewers in the last year,
and of course all of our podcast productions are available
on YouTube, Spotify, iHeartRadio, and of course Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
So check it out.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
Let us know which show is your favorite in the comments,
and of course we will catch you next time right
here on Fast Casual Nation.
We are back here on Fast Casual Nation, the podcast
that started it all. Today I'm going to be flying
solo without my co host shere Candler, but that doesn't
matter because today we have one of I think one
of the best fast casual concepts in the country, and
that is Suvla coming in with me. Of course, it's
Charles Billillis, who is the CEO and founder over there.
Great to see you, how are you.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Always a pleasure to see you. Thank you so much
for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
My name is Paul Baron. As the early pioneer in
fast casual, I've seen the industry evolve from just a
few operators to the most sought after segment by consumers
around the world. Now we're planning to shape its future.
Taping to decades of my expertise identifying the emerging brands
and tech winners in the space. Saber Capital will be
(01:08):
fueling the next generation of fast casual innovation. So we
were kind of having, you know, old times prior to
the recording and when I go back, yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah, a while.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
Yeah, And what was the location that when I visited
San Francisco you had just opened it up?
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Was it? Hayes is our original location.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
That's the original location.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
It was a brand new one though.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
That's right, that's right, we had opened up.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
For those familiar with the city of San Francisco, we
had opened at that point.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
That was our fourth restaurant.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
That's on Chestnut Street, which is in the Marine District
of San Francisco.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Yeah, and if you guys have never been to a Suvla,
what I will tell you is this. This is one
of those concepts that the first time that I walked
in I'm showing some video on screen here. First of all,
I could not believe that it was a fast casual concept.
Uh and the idea of lower cost food at this
price point absolutely blew me away. And obviously, Charles, you
(02:10):
and your team do a fantastic job with soul. Tell
me what's new? What are you guys up to?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Yeah? Sure, I mean just to it's funny.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
So the video there is on our website, which we
you know, that was taken many years ago. But when
when the when obviously Subla was quite new and honestly
the format was quite new.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
We've we've positioned Souvlo.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
As they may mentioned, we're about to celebrate eleven years
in business next month. But I believe so it will
be the first in what we call the fast find category,
which is based which is you know, obviously this is
fast casual nation. Fast Line is is sort of exists
within the fast casual genre, but at more of the premium. Yes,
(02:55):
and really and really it's about combining the more traditional
fast casual model with my fine dining background. So you
have you have a you have a fast casual restaurant
where you still ordered the counter, but it looks and
acts and feels like a full service restaurant. And and now,
you know, a decade later, we're seeing many, many, many
of the of the souvla of which is really great.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Yeah, that's cool because back.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Then and still to this day, you know, I had
the belief that this is the way that people.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
Want to eat, you know now where whereas where it's
they want quality, they want you know, relative low costs,
they want obviously high value, but they also want the
freedom and flexibility to interact with the restaurant and and
the brand overall in many ways.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Well, and I think the key here is is that
we have seen so much growth in fast casual over
the last five years, and a lot of it has
been on the what I call the upper tier, much
like what you're talking about, that fine casual experience. We've
seen it here in Miami where we're located, also seen
a lot going on in New York, which at one
time Fast Casual had almost vacated New York, But we
(04:06):
started to see a little bit of resurgence here in
the last eighteen months, So I think it's coming back.
Now here's my question to you, and I want because
obviously today's topic is going to be talking about gen
Z and their attraction to this particular category that is
so dynamic. And when I get a chance to visit
almost all of the restaurants that we cover here on
the show, the one thing that I have seen nationwide
(04:29):
is what appears to be a demographic shift. But that
being said, when I was at your restaurant six and
seven years ago, you were already there, You had already
kind of achieved that connection to a different demographic. First
of all, how's it going now with that demographic when
you look at gen Z and millennials, and why do
(04:52):
you think the attraction is so strong?
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Now, I'll take the second question.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
First, I think that it's to my earlier point, it's
about having the flexibility within that restaurant and that restaurant brand.
Subla has almost since it's it's very very beginning been
in an omni channel business. So even you know, back
in the day, when you think about ten years ago,
(05:18):
in a more traditional fast casual setup, this is before
delivery was as widespread as it is now.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
There were no apps, there was very little online order.
You had to go.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
When you think about you know, when you talk about
New York City and and those brands, you know, vacating,
you had to go, and you had to wait in line,
and it was this sort of serve you know, this
this make line and you kind of like get your train,
you're in, you're out.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
It was it was it was very.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
In person, sort of manual right bye bye. By nature
of starting here in the Bay Area, we just naturally
end up at the at the tip of the sphere
with all things food and tech and then and are
able to integrate those things in a way that feels
very natural. So we were very early on in online ordering.
(06:03):
We were amongst the first to work with companies that
obviously are now very well known like door Dash and Caviat.
So all of those things have been a part of
our DNA for a very very long time, and of course,
to your point, all of those things have become very
much a part of gen Z's sort of daily life.
(06:23):
I think I think the I think the the second
part of it is is just how approachable Suvla is
to basically anyone, right. You know, the restaurants are open
seven days a week. They're opened straight through from lunch
all the way through dinner. You don't need to make reservations,
you don't need to. You can come alone and feel
(06:44):
comfortable dining solo. You can come with you know, a
friend or a partner or a group of people. You
can order in person to dine in or take to go.
You can order online and pay ahead and just come
and grab your food from our sidewalk facing pickup window.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
You can order delivery.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
I think the really really cool thing and and probably
one of the sweetest parts of the of the Subla
story over the many years, was just before COVID, we
we sort of started getting into the wedding business. And
that was not by intent, but it's because But it's
because the Sublo had been a place for so many,
so many people where they went on their first date
(07:23):
at Suvla. They met in line at Suvla. We actually
had someone proposed to his now wife at Suvla. So
we would get these inbound emails saying, hey, listen, like
we want to kind of complete the circle, you know,
would you cater our wedding?
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Subla has been has been a part.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
Of our uh relationship, you know, from from the very
very beginning, so we've we've actually catered a couple of
weddings on that account. I think the interesting thing here
we are twenty twenty five sort of you know, looking forward,
you know we we at Subla, are you know, really
trying to maintain you know, everything that got us here
(08:02):
at quality, consistency value, being able to be the omni channel,
to make sure that it's we want to make it
as easy for people to order and get souplot you know,
to where they are by any means. What's the big
shift for us in the last few years. And this
(08:23):
is kind of referring more to my generation. I'm forty two,
so the elder millennial I believe we are referred to
at this point. I still think umbridge a little bit
with that with that classification, because I do remember our
life before before cell phones and everything, and I know
how to use a roadary phone. No, what's been interesting
(08:46):
to see is the natural evolution of a customer's life.
And when you think about over over ten years, people
that were dining with us, you know, back in twenty fourteen,
fifteen sixteen, twenty thirty something young single, you know, living
in the city, generally working in you know, for startups.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
I'm overly generalizing here, of course.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
But but when you think about these people now, you know,
they're generally married, they've started families, they are are in
a place where they probably it doesn't make as much
sense for them to live in a in a city,
so they started to migrate out to some of the
(09:31):
surrounding areas. So coming out of COVID, you know, we were,
you know, pre COVID, we were getting ready to go
to New York. We were like, let's go bring through
the to New York. This has worked well here. We
want to be you know, subil is an urban neighborhood brand.
Coming out of COVID, you know, we obviously didn't go
to New York. We we knew that we lost a
(09:54):
lot of our core clientele through just all the data
that we had, but we realized in digging into the
sort of demo data and sales data and things like
that they didn't go that far.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
They actually stayed within the Bay Area.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
And we get countless emails every week, please open a
sup here, Please open a souple here.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Sure we and we had for.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
A long time UH resisted going to some of these
outlying markets like a Palo Alto or a Walnut Creek.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Or uh Marine, which is where our six.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Restaurant is now, because but now we've sort of realized that, like,
we need to be bringing students to these people. These
are some of our earliest and biggest customers and they
just miss having Sulo because they now no longer live
in the in the neighborhood where there was a Souvlo,
or they no longer have to commute to an office
that was near one of our one of our restaurants.
(10:47):
So it's like, okay, how do we how do we
bring Subla to them? So that's really how we're kind
of thinking about things moving forward right now.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Well, I think the see the key thing that we've
seen with gen Z is this trans position obviously with millennials,
but also gen Z. It has been unique because it
has not been a one for one, meaning some restaurant
brands that were very prolific in the millennial audience didn't
necessarily pick up the gen Z audience, and you guys
(11:16):
have been one of those that have been able to
spread between those two demographics. And I think it shows
up a lot with it if you look at the
menu transition. This is a quick article from Fastcasual dot com.
Gen Z driving twenty twenty five casual menu trends and
also are Fast Casual menu trends, but I think they're
driving trends across the entire food space when you look
(11:39):
at what you guys are doing. First of all, have
you done anything recently that has moved away from maybe
the traditional menu that at least I remember, you know,
seven eight years ago. Have you guys started to expand
out that on that or is it pretty much the
same core menu.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
I'll be honestbo, our menu hasn't changed since you were
last in one of our restaurants.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
So if it works, don't mess with it.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
Well, you know it is that.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
I think that it is one of those things with
Soublo because of the reputation that we have built with
the brand over over a decade now, people actually really
really love They love Supler for many reasons, but one
of them is the fact that it doesn't change and
that it is it is always there.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
It is a it is a constant.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
I sort of joke that like that you know now
when you when you move to to a city like SF,
it's like you've got you know, water power, internet, souvla.
I mean it, it's like it sort of functions in
that way where it's like if there's ever a day
where it's like there's some sort of an outage or
whatever it is, it's like people freak out. It's almost
(12:44):
like if our if our internet went down right now,
we would be panicking, you know. If you know, it's
rare that that that sublas are closed, but if there
was something where we had to close the restaurant for
maintenance or whatever it is, it becomes this huge sort
of panic. So having said that, you know, one of
the things that we are looking at for this year
is to sort of get get into the sort of
(13:06):
you know what we refer to in the industry as
the the the lt O game. And so we're and
so we're working on some some menu items that will
sort of be sort of introduced for for limited periods
of time again just to kind of like you know,
keep you know, ten years in, you know, we're we're very,
very fortunate to have a brands as strong and as
(13:27):
and has loved as the as the Supler brand, but
also recognizing the fact that you know, ten years in,
there's a lot of similar operations to us locally, you know,
whereas when we first started it was a very unique,
unusual concept and format and things like that, and now
we're just seeing a lot of I don't want to
call them copycats but because they're not, but they're obviously,
(13:48):
you know, adapting our formats.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
So we want to continue to keep top of mind.
So there wasn't some of these yeah things are pig
our list.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
I think there was a handful of concepts there in
San Francisco that had really kind of leveraged up to
your point. But back to the menu thing, and before
I get to that, is one thing about Suvla and
now that I know, you know, you guys have pretty
much stayed true to what the brand's core is. That's
something that I think is a differentiator probably in most
(14:18):
light where you guys have elevated the quality of the
product so much so that it's required so much to
leap to it in terms of competition, I'm curious. When
I was out there on that trip, I visited three
different concepts and they're all I believe they're all still operating.
One was bun Me Denise Trand I think she just
(14:40):
is still moving along in San Francisco.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
Yeah, she just she just opened up in in SFO
and I believe she's operating that herself. It is, I mean,
it is absolutely crushing it. It's my it's my go
to spot. Whenever I love it, I'm flying in and out.
I mean, she's in a really really good job with that.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
With that, how about how about Rome Artisan? Are they
still around? Did they make it?
Speaker 3 (15:02):
Rose Room still going, Rum still going? Josh A Zella
is a good friend of mine. They just opened up
actually fairly close to us in Marine over in the
town over the Corbu town of Country, I think, or
shopping center or something like that.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
All three of those.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Yeah, it was like a Triplet's in San Francisco in
terms of really high quality, fast casuals that we're setting
the stage and then of course, we saw a lot
of movement into what you're talking about, which is kind
of the competitive layer where they started to see the
success of think of brands like you really going in
that direction and exposing some of the weaknesses of fast casual.
(15:41):
To me, I see that there are some weaknesses in
the category right now, and it's usually on the down side,
meaning the side that's trying to become a little bit
closer to quick serf, usually through price, maybe through some
menu selections, possibly implementing drive through, or you know, trying
to to do some things that are very q r
(16:02):
qs r ask. Not that that's a bad thing, but
I just think customers are trying to delineate because most
of the time fast casual has elevated up to almost
compete with casual dining. When you when you look at that, Charles,
and especially in the gen Z crowd, because price is
a big point and you guys kind of walk that
(16:23):
very fine line between casual dining and true fast casual.
How have you been able to hold that line first?
And do you feel like you are garnering customers from
upstream or downstream that are trading up Where do you
feel like you get the most bang for that, I think.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
We're Yeah, so I think I think to answer your question,
I mean a lot of that just lies with me
and just and just and maybe I'm just stubborn, but
it's just like, this is the vision, this is the
this is what we do.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
And then there are certain things that we just that
we just don't do, you know.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
And so you know, and I always I often reference
this of like, you know, we always think of our
restaurants whenever we're integrating something into it, whether it's you know,
a menu item or a change revolution or a design
or touch point or anything like that. You know, we
always we always ask ourself the questions, is it's nice
enough that I could that I can bring a date here?
Speaker 2 (17:16):
And I think that's that's that's one of the big
things that really sets us apart. You know.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
People see they look at the super the menu and
they're like, oh, this is like this is a fast
casual lunch. You guys must do a big lunch. Like actually,
we do more business in the evenings than we do
during the day. You know, these are these restaurants. To
my earlier point about weddings, these are nice enough that
you can bring a date too, And so I think
and which I think is also what helps us resonate
with the sort of gen Z crowd because you get
(17:43):
you get basically eighty percent of the full service, you know,
mid tier sort of restaurant dining experience at fifty percent
of the price.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
And so and when I mean think about think about Paul,
when you and I were were that age one time,
we were like, you know, generally, you know, money is
is is.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Well, you also just don't have as much of it,
you know.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
And I think and I and I and I and
I think today in today's day and age, where we are,
you know, the cost of you know, for my wife
and I had to go out to eat at even
sort of like a mid tier full service restaurant, nothing
super fancy, and even you're talking about like you know,
an entry level bottle, bottle of wine, maybe sharing app,
maybe even share an entre, you're still looking at one hundred,
(18:31):
one hundred and fifty bucks. You know, you could you
could go and do that at soup Lab, same stuff
and do it for sixty you know. And so so
I think that's that's also just you know a big
part of it too.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
It is we we do.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
We do bump into sort of some some and especially
after we opened our marine shop, people walk in and
they even though the counter is right at the front door,
they walk in.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
And they sit down and then they're like, well, no
one's come to my table, where's the where's where's the surf?
Speaker 1 (19:05):
From there, you go, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
I'm a little a little a little too nice maybe
in exactly yeah, respect because you think that you're in
a full service restaurant.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
It's funny. I remember the experience vividly, and it's one
of those that you know, it's it's rare. I've been
in thousands of fast casual concepts and and Suvla is
one that I would I would definitely put it in
the top ten in terms of just memory of food,
the experience of just the buzz of the restaurant, the
theme that you guys have going in terms of the
(19:35):
Greek theme, which I think is dead on with right now,
both from a diet standpoint, you know, just in how
we're eating these days, but also I think what we've
seen in the space, especially in fast casual, that has
leaned a little bit more toward healthy but yet still
at the same time, flavorful and just you know, super
(19:55):
great in terms of the way that menus are constructed
these days. I want to take make a break real
quick and mention our partner, but I want to we're
going to get back and we're going to I want
to talk to you about kind of the magic sauce
of where you guys think this market's going, because especially
in fine casual, because this is maybe this is a
new era that could be evolving in a big way.
(20:19):
So let's cut to our partner here. If you guys,
of course, are not at the Fast Casual Summit, this
is a place that you've got to go to. And
of course this is now going on it's twentieth year
and it is the industry event that shapes the future
of fast casual. It's led, obviously by our co host
Charic Canceler and her team over at NetWorld Media Group.
(20:41):
They do a fantastic job at this. We will actually
be airing our podcast from this event this year, So
make sure and jump over to Fastcasual dot com and
go to Fastcasual Summit dot com if you want to
just register and start checking out the agenda. It's going
to be a big one this year as well, and
we'll get back to the show. All right, So I'm
back here with Charles Billillison. We are talking about Suvla
(21:04):
and the future of maybe fine casual right now. Charles,
when you look at the category of upscale fast casual
fine casual and the number of brands that have now
started to come into the space nationwide, do you think
this is a trend that maybe is just fast casual
three point zero the next generation of it.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Well, I mean, first of all, I want to thank
you for your kind words, uh, just prior to the
break there about you know, you obviously travel the world
or and travel the country at least and really focus
on this on this format.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
So to have Subla live in your mind in that way,
it's a good one. Really, really really really means a lot,
it does.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
I mean, this is something that we've been you know,
that I've been working on for well beyond the the
eleven years that we've that we've been in business. So
I just want to thank you for that. No, I
think that it's my earlier point and we we we
we referred to Subla as fast fine. I think you
can call it whatever you want. That's just the name
that stuck with us. But people are saying find casual
(22:04):
fast fine. You know, I don't disagree with the notion
of the of the you know, this potentially becoming fast
casual three point h I think you're starting to see
it a little bit more with some of the bigger.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Players out there.
Speaker 3 (22:19):
I think, I think the the biggest challenge and something
that that you know, we at Subla, you know, spend
an awful lot of our time on is the is
the service and hospitality side of things and also just
the the the total guest experience and really thinking about
all of the other you know, service centers and touch points,
(22:40):
whether it's you know, the lighting or the candles on
the table in the evening, or you know the artwork
or how you're rated, or you know, flatware plate where
we just went through a big f F and sort
of you know, switch up in terms of just you know,
leveling up you know some of some of those items
as well. All of that stuff matters. I think it
probably gets a little more challenging at you know, at
(23:03):
a at a national scale. You know, we we right
now are still in one market within with six restaurants,
but that that becomes you know, the bigger, the bigger
sort of challenge. But yeah, I listen, I think that
you know, to my point, you know, twelve years ago
in terms of you know, this is this is how
people want to eat moving forward, I think that that
(23:26):
has very much, you know, played itself out. And like
I said, we we've been at the at the tip
of this sphere for quite some time.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
But we are not resting on our on our laurels.
Speaker 3 (23:34):
So we're always looking at at opportunities to you know,
do more, do better, you know, you know, make things,
you know, make the make the overall experience for the guests,
you know, memorable, like you're like your first signing experience
with us whatever, seventy eight years ago.
Speaker 2 (23:52):
So and that's and there are so many little things.
I think.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
The the thing that is that always is I always
sort of laugh about, is we get a lot of
inbound whether it's for people that want to you know,
that are asking us to franchise, or people that want
to investor you know, why can't you open here, here, here, here, here.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
These are very.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
These are very people intensive businesses, and these are actually
very complicated businesses.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
And restaurants to run.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
People see a menu with four items on it. You know,
the menu at first glance looks very very minimalist, in
which in which in many ways it is. But I
think for those in the in the in the food space,
you know, the the simpler a dish looks on plate,
you know, the the harder it is to actually execute
(24:37):
because you're because you're no longer distracted by a million
different things.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
It's crazy. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
So well, the quality and I think the flexibility of
what you guys have brought, you know, that's right, And
that's my question is do you think it can scale?
Do you think we can get to a brand like
Souvla that could have fifty units, maybe we don't see
thousands like what Kava is trying to do, But Kava
kind of was breed from that that ilk, you know,
very high quality, chef driven. Now they're going after, you know,
(25:06):
hundreds of units. And what is your thought on that
in terms of growth in this this area?
Speaker 2 (25:12):
I mean two things.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
One to your earlier point, in terms of the food itself,
Greek cuisine or the or the or the broader category
is something that obviously has been around for uh thousands
of years, but is very much a testament just as
much then as it is now to how people want
(25:33):
to eat these This is this is wholesome healthy food.
When you look at the super menu, it's a lot
of lean protein, it's a lot of vegetables, it's a
lot of whole foods.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
These are these are These are.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
Dishes that you want to and can eat multiple times
a week. You know, we have guests that dine with us.
You know, yeah, I have six days a week. You know,
I myself eat soup labe, you know, basically on a
daily basis. You know, you you want to and you
can eat this and you feel good eating it.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Also, are the menu.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
The way that it's set up, there's a lot of
freedom and flexibility. It may look very rapid, but because
we have these dishes that have these sort of set
menusets with them, they go on with the protein. We
can adapt to most people's preferences. So if you're not
eating dairy, or if you're not if you're not eating meat,
we have fed options. You know, if we can, we
can omit certain things so so so we can tailor
(26:31):
those dishes. I think as far as scale goes, one
of the great things about about SUVLA and and and
the category overall is that there's no regional bias behind it.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
You know, I am I am a proud Greek.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
Uh American and Subla is obviously a California, Northern California brand.
But it's unlike a pizza or barbecue or some of
these other categories that have these regional biases to them.
There is no regional bias to sufl you know, if
you were to probably fight as California Greek, that can
(27:06):
translate to any any any major market. And I think
also just going back to you know, the volume and
and that and that, you know the fact that there's
this quite frankly love affair with our with our menu,
you know, with our with our guests. They're they're like,
you know, obsessed over whether it's our frozen Greek yogurt
or you know, traditional egg lemon soup. Things like that.
(27:28):
People want to be you know, they're like creating it
and they and they want to and can have it
many days a week. The other the other, you know,
part to the to the format is just the overall
economic and sort of business model. Like Suvla served Sula
as a as a company last year served just over
a million meals out of six restaurants, So we obviously
(27:48):
do a lot of volume. And the fact that this
is an om channel business means that you know, you
get the same great food, you know, whether you're dining in,
you're taking to go, you're having it delivered, you're ordering
it online, and you're having it catered. So everything is
really designed, you know, to be done at scale. So
I think the hardest part with retuct is are are
(28:11):
scaling is it? Like I may mentioned earlier, it's a
very people intensive business.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
So it's it's it's real estate and it's people first
and foremost.
Speaker 3 (28:21):
And you know, once we have those things locked, everything
else kind of falls into place. But we are very
very selective about where we go, about the about the
physical space, about where it actually is inside of a
city or a town.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
And then of course you know, we spend a tremendous
amount of our time and our resources, uh, you know,
developing you know, our our leaders, in our in our
in our team members.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Well, and I think you you hit on so many
good things there, but you didn't answer my question, and
that is scale. Yes, I love the The.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
The short answer is yes. The longer answer is yes.
But it will It will definitely take time to do
it right. I think you and I have both seen
over the years a lot of these fast castual brands,
you know, raise tremendous amounts of money, scale very very quickly,
(29:14):
and then.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Just say the words, well, listen, you're pretty still around.
They're doing they're doing great.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
I'm just saying that traded they have a market cap
of many billions of dollars.
Speaker 2 (29:25):
You know.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
It's like they're and they're and they're and they're and
they're growing, you know, and and we and we and
we like those guys. I've known Nick for for a
long time. They may not be profitable, but they've definitely
built something that's still around. My My point is, you know,
we we don't follow the traditional playbook of you know,
raising from venture or private equity, which you.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Know comes you know, tons of money and headlines, but
comes with this, with this, with this unrealistic pressure to grow,
you know.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
So you know it's like to your point, yes it can,
Well that could it scale to fifty units in two years?
Speaker 2 (30:02):
No? Could it scale the fifty units in ten years? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (30:05):
Probably, you know, to do it right and you need
a lot of things, but time is one of the
biggest ones, because yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Yeah, I think you're heading on the right direction in
terms of just that the potential of scaling and how
scaling is going to work for brands like you guys.
If you get up to fifty units, first of all,
the ability just because of the AUV size and throughput
that you guys have been able to do that in
itself is going to be like one hundred store chain
by itself by most fast casual standards. So I would
(30:36):
agree with you there, and you look at just the
concept of being able to deliver at this level of high,
super high quality, ridiculous experience. That's the thing I'm curious
about because when I started in fast casual, it was
you could tell the differences. Most of them were California brands.
(30:57):
You know, if you go back to Greg dollar Hyde
and what Baja Fresh was doing, you look at the
early stages of all those guys, they were really separating
between QSR and I felt like that that most of
fast casual had lost its way kind of trying to
dumb it down to get to the point where they
could scale. And there's only a few founders guys like
yourself that have stayed with the ideas maybe there's something
(31:20):
bigger here, you know, in terms of crossing over a
multitude of categories. And now I think maybe the demographic
of gen Z may appreciate this differently than the previous
generations that have come before. So that's the thing I'm
going to as are we maybe at the edge of
a boom going forward?
Speaker 2 (31:42):
I would tend to agree.
Speaker 3 (31:43):
It's funny as you were, as you mentioned that, I
was thinking a little bit about you mentioned earlier about
people trading down or trading up the consumer, and I think,
what's interesting, and again we're able to sort of see
this through a different lens, just based off of being
in Northern California, which is, you know, in many ways
a bubble and bubble in a bubble, So you know,
you want to talk about tip of the sphere, it's
tip of the sphere in a different way in terms
(32:05):
of like oftentimes what happens here from a socio economic
standpoint makes its way throughout the rest of the country.
So I was thinking a little bit about the when
you think about a gen Z customer trading up from
a from a QSR, because now in California with the
Fast Act you know the you know, for for a
(32:26):
QSR you know worker, it's twenty dollars an hour. Therefore,
your your value meal is now approaching the cost of
or is probably just as much as a you know,
a sandwich or salad from from asuvla.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
Now for the same basically the same.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
Amount of money, you get a much higher quality product
that's you know, made fresh, that's good for you, that
you feel good eating, and you get to do it
in a wonderful restaurant space or obviously from your house
or your office or whatever. And then on the on
the flip side, you know, when I mentioned, you know,
(33:04):
just the the general check average of of a you know,
entry level, mid tier, full service restaurant, it's like, well,
you can only afford to do that several times a week,
you know.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
For it's you know, my wife always jokes whenever we
go out to eat, I'll look at it. I'll look
at the menu.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
I'll look at like the sides, and there'll be like
a vegetable side at this restaurant and it'll be fifteen bucks,
and I'll.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Be like, that's a that's a super a super chicken
sandwich right here.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Fight for my side of broccoli now and just like
you know, so, so there's so and listen, I think
we all know why that is what it what it
needs to be in those types of restaurants.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
But but but in Sula, it doesn't need it doesn't
need to.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
Be like yeah, you know, well, value is going to win,
the service win is going to win. And I think
these these consumers are starting to understand that because there's
really three things of whether it is fast, casual three
point zero, or it's you know, kind of this evolution
of what we'll see and find casual is that if
(34:05):
you've got super high quality, which you guys check, you
know you've got good value versus that quality check, and
then you have something that is that X factor. Usually
it's going to be either on the healthy side or
on the flavor side, and you guys kind of mix
into both of those. So I'm I'm very intrigued that
you know, Subla's growth pattern might be, uh set for
(34:28):
Are you prepared for growth? Do you want to grow?
What's your what's your current company culture?
Speaker 2 (34:33):
We are we are set for growth.
Speaker 3 (34:35):
We are prepared for growth with with respect to the
team that we have in place here. So there's seven
of us that oversee all of the restaurants.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
All of our sort.
Speaker 3 (34:46):
Of quote unquote services are in house, so finance, HR operations,
you know, very very little is outsourced so so and
and you know our ops team is you know, are
in our restaurants every day. Is a very very hands
on company. Both myself and Tony who's our chef and
part of the business, are very hands on people. We
(35:07):
are very present with that. My focus these days is
more on the growth side of things and really scouting
real estate and and uh negotiating deals and looking for
opportunities for for the brand.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
I think the differentiating.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Factor is is that we don't have any outside funding.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
There's no it's a huge fund is huge.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
It's huge, So there's no venture, there's no private equity.
We do not franchise, which basically allows us to have
allows us to have.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Total control of what we do.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
And we don't have any and we don't have any
external pressure to sign the least that we don't want
to sign, or to hire a person that don' want
to hire, or to move into a market that we
don't feel comfortable in. You know, we we we spend
most of our time turning down opportunities and then we'll
also looking for you know, the right the right ones,
and so you know that obviously slows down the pace
(36:07):
of growth.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
I mean, access to capital is not much of an
issue for us, but.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
We when when it when when it does come time
to build out restaurants, but we are but it does
slow it down with with respect to you know, how
many we could open at at at a given time.
We like to do a restaurant a year. That's generally
the pace that we prefer. Obviously, COVID, you know, kind
of through a wrench in that for for a little bit,
but we got back onto it. We're a little behind
(36:32):
right now and that we're we haven't found the right
piece of real estate locally here for us, for for
our seventh restaurant. It also is a little challenging when
you're trying to to compete with larger brands like a
Sweet Green or a Pavo or you know, any of
those brands where you know, we'll look at well, we'll
look at deals, you know, and we'll look at some
of these leases and we'll run the numbers and it's like, well,
(36:52):
this doesn't make any financial sense. And for us, you know,
our restaurants. Our restaurants are all profitable. They've always been profitable, thankfully,
with the exception of twenty twenty. But they just they
just they function like old school businesses and the fact
that they need to make money, right because if they don't.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
We would have money.
Speaker 3 (37:10):
So I know, I know, it's so crazy, this notion
of like a business need to be profitable.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
I mean, I'm very very important, you know.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
Very very fortunate that the businesses have been profitable since
you know, the earliest of of of days. Those that
had the ability to invest in in our in our
first few restaurants, you know, the first three we did
with some outside uh individuals, and then the second three
we've done ourselves. So the ones that that did have
the opportunity to get in it did well. The first
(37:39):
restaurant I think beat the S and P in ten years,
so as far as a return on capital. So but again,
you know, this is one of those things where when
you talk about secret sauce, you know, real estate plays
are really really big part of that.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
I've been a big you know, I've always.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
Felt really strongly about doing you know, the hard work
and on real estate, walking away from things that don't
make that, don't check all the boxes. I think depending
on the market, you know, or neighborhood, there's a big
difference between you know what, what block you're on, what
side of the block you're on, all of those things.
It's not as it's not as easy to people like, oh,
(38:18):
you just open up over here, it'll be fine.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
It's like it's not that easy, you know.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Okay, I'm going to save one question for you when
we come back here from our break, and uh, it's
going to be a good on because it's gonna be
talking about real estate. But we're going to get get
into our our partner here. If you guys are not aware,
Saver pivoted our business about a year ago and we
are still our thought leadership platform on podcasting. But Savior
(38:42):
Capital Advisory was launched and we have dedicated now a
group of advisors and funds into early stage, fast casual
much like what we're talking with Suvla and Charles, but
we're looking for those operators and also tech companies that
are looking to maybe level up. And again we're a
different kind of capital and advisory group. Go over to
(39:03):
Saver at dot FM. You can learn a little bit
more about it just over on our website click services
and you can pull down all of that good stuff.
Another thing that we have going on that you guys
may not be aware of is Fast Casual front Runners. Now,
this is an event that we're going to be hosting
that is going to be a mini series of fast
casual concepts growing in the US. We're going to pick
(39:26):
a winner and then give them a funding and advisory package.
We'll be partnered with a special partner. We'll talk about
those guys here pretty soon.
Speaker 2 (39:35):
So check that.
Speaker 1 (39:36):
All out over at Saverre dot FM. Back to the show,
all right, My last question to you, Charles is this,
let's get into real estate because this, to me is
like the potential for market to be maybe somewhat depressed
now is And I know you were around and watched
(39:57):
the industry in two thousand and eight where we saw
really the birth of fastca I think yes, that was
really the core birth. It had been around obviously for
much longer, but that's when we saw the explosion. Are
we nearing a potential real estate opportunity for fast casual growth?
What you're seeing it out there yet? In in San
(40:17):
Francisco or in maybe some of the surrounding markets.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
I think it's interesting because I would say I have answer.
I have both a yes and a no answer to that.
I think yes. I think yes.
Speaker 3 (40:32):
If you are an emerging brand that is not as
risk averse right now, you have an opportunity to get
into some downtown areas like here where I am in
in uh San Francisco, which obviously has you know, had
(40:54):
you know, this is obviously public knowledge.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
I would say, the.
Speaker 3 (40:56):
Slowest you know, bounce back from from COVID, so you're
able to kind of you know, there are plenty of
office buildings and landlords that are are desperate for quality
operators that are willing to extend you know, pretty great deals.
You know, I know some deals that have gotten done downtown,
you know where it's like free rent for the first.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
Year or percentage only or things along those lines.
Speaker 3 (41:20):
Now, I think that's that's really really great for a
for an upstart, you know, emerging brand. I think it
gets a little bit trickier for for you know, say
a brand like Soulo, where you know, these have to
spin up pretty quickly.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
We don't have the you know, the.
Speaker 3 (41:40):
Bandwidth to kind of tolerate, you know, this, you know,
whenever people are going to come.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Back to the office.
Speaker 3 (41:44):
So I think there are some deals to be done
in some of those areas. And whether they're in cities
you know, like here where there's were you know, uh,
we're trying to get everyone back in the office still,
or maybe some larger projects that are there coming online
that want to be able to sort of secure the
office tenant because they have X, Y Z yeah, best
(42:07):
casual fast find whatever restaurant brand in their in their building.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
You know.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
I think I think the I think the biggest shift
is is, you know, between office and retail is they've
realized now the power of high quality F and B
offerings and so and so and so that becomes the
lore to get you know, the other retail tenant to
come in, or to get the large office tenant to
(42:31):
go upstairs or all of those things.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
So that's the guest answer to the question.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
The no answer the question, at least from where I am,
is you know some of these so so pre covid
uh suburbs.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Were not cool. We're not hot. No one wanted to
be there as you No, I'm just saying broadly, you know,
and if you and.
Speaker 3 (42:49):
You and if you had asked me obviously you know,
twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, I would have said, no, I am,
We're going to We're going to Manhattan, We're going to La,
We're going to you know, all those, all those places
since to my earlier point, you know, because of COVID,
because people didn't have to commute into the office, or
they've moved out of these cities and they're and they're
(43:10):
living in these you know very you know, I would
say wealthy.
Speaker 2 (43:16):
Areas. They this consumer.
Speaker 3 (43:20):
Wants, craves, demands and can afford high quality food and
beverage right at any price point, whether it's you know
Asubla or you know, a high quality full service operator
that they just those are markets that just have never
really been serviced by by those brands before. And so Marin,
(43:40):
you know where we opened up is a is a
great example where we're in a complex there called the
Marine Country Mark, and we're surrounded by very high quality
both food and beverage.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
And fashion brands.
Speaker 3 (43:50):
And so now it's like, why why would I need
to live in San Francisco or a city where I
can live in Marin and I can go and net
SUVLA and shop at James Purse or Goop or you know,
and then and then also bring the kids to Shakeshack
and everything else like that.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
You've gotten all there. So what's what's interesting back in the.
Speaker 3 (44:07):
Real estate front is that there's now a demand for
all these brands, whether they're food and beverage or retail,
they want to get into these markets.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
And it's just driven rents through the roof.
Speaker 3 (44:20):
You know, and so and so and so we're looking
at deals, you know in some of these you know,
high streets of these of these suburbs, and you know
these are at least rates that are higher than our
pre COVID San Francisco leases.
Speaker 2 (44:33):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
So you know, it gets it gets challenging because from
our end, we want to do more here. We have
where we're resourced to do it, We have the team
that wants to do it, and we want to We
want to get up to you know, say call it
ten units here in the Bay Area because we know
that we can you know, we have the infrastructure to.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Handle that here.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
It's really coming. It's really just finding the right spaces
that meet our needs that also have landlords that are
that want to support you know, a business like Superland
are willing to be fair with their with their leases
because from our end, you know, we've got a very
very savvy back office over here, so you know, we
look at an l all I we run those numbers.
Speaker 2 (45:11):
We can very quickly determine if the landlord is making
more money and this sort of deal than we are.
Speaker 3 (45:17):
And we're not in the business of you know, landlords
you know, making more money than we are.
Speaker 2 (45:21):
You know, so.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
Unless they're unless they're building the whole thing out. And
quite frankly, you know, when you when you do that,
when you do that, when you do that math, oftentimes
that that costs capital is more expensive than it is
to borrow from a bank or to you know, private
funding or you know, any of those things. So it's
a it's a it's a very very viewanced. It's it's
(45:45):
very it's it's very hit, it's very hit or miss,
you know. I think that I think there's a big
opportunity for brands in this space, Super included, not that
we have anything that we're actually looking at, but I
think there's a big opportunity to partner with you know,
all larger operation, you know, whether it's a.
Speaker 2 (46:04):
Hotel group, or you know, some other sort.
Speaker 3 (46:06):
Of retail uh developer that sees the value in having
a souvla or a soupla of in their complex or
in the lobby of their hotel or any of those
things that are able to provide more resources, whether it's capital,
whether it's the actual infrastructure, because you know, unfortunately the
(46:26):
cost of building these restaurants is almost doubled since COVID,
you know so, and you know, all things.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Remaining equal, that means, you know, the payback on that.
Speaker 3 (46:36):
Investment has now effectively doubled, you know so, So there
are opportunities I think that that exists, especially in some
of these pricey cities, to find to kind of do
almost like a like a joint venture. I think it's
I mean, I think it's also potentially where where this
is going as well.
Speaker 1 (46:55):
Listen, it has been so good catching up with you
and what you guys are doing out there. We're we're
going to try to get on as you saw in
the front Runner series, We're going to be doing a
whole mini series on some of the top fast casuals nationwide.
So it would be good to get back into San
Francisco and maybe pick up new a new brand, but
if you do, if I am back there, I'm definitely
(47:15):
going to be visiting Sublas. So Charles has been great
having you on the show. Thanks so much for stopping
in today.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
Paul, thank you so much. Always am plu here.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
You bet all right. Last up, of course, if you
guys are not tuned in to our YouTube channel, make
sure and check out Savor dot Fm. You can just
jump over to our website. You can also visit Fastcasual
dot com, our show partner on this Visit the YouTube
channel because we are now nearing two hundred thousand subscribers
(47:44):
and over one point one million viewers in the last year,
and of course all of our podcast productions are available
on YouTube, Spotify, iHeartRadio, and of course Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
So check it out.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
Let us know which show is your favorite in the comments,
and of course we will catch you next time right
here on Fast Casual Nation.
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