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Thank you. And we likewise have Clinton Anderson, the CEO of Fourth, who will be moderating the discussion with Jason. So Jason, how about I let you give the audience some information about your background and you can likewise tell them a little bit about Chop Store. And then I'll let you take it from there, Clinton.

Thanks Christina. My name is Jason Morgan, CEO of Original Chop Shop. I've been doing this for about nine years now. We bought the brand in 2016three unitsand I've grown it to 26. Prior to this, I have actually spent many of my career in hospitality in some shape or type. After a brief stint of attempting to be an accountant for about a year and a half, I transitioned into gambling establishment property and worked in corporate financing.

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

We're at the counter, we bring the food to the table. The key to the program is we have a beverage element as well with fresh-squeezed juices and protein shakes.

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A little more complicated than a few of the walk-the-line concepts that are out there, but we think we've got something quite special. We're going to add another shop this year and at least 4 stores next year. So we will be 31 approximately shops by the end of next year.

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I've been in this role for about six years. 4th, as many of you understand, is a leading provider of software services to the restaurant and hospitality market. Our goal is to assist our customers be effective in driving profitability and being efficientmanaging labor, handling stock, and essentially providing them with tools they need to provide their vision.

It's rare to have companies that are precious and growing rapidly, that can duplicate that success every year. Jason, one of the factors I was so fired up to have you join our session is the success at Zos was amazing. I've just satisfied a handful of brand names where there was such a strong customer affinity for the brand name.

When you talk to consumers about Chop Shop, they enjoy the location. And to be able to take what is a relatively complicated idea in terms of delivering a great experience for the consumer, and be able to grow that from a couple of stores to now north of 30 shops next yearit's fantastic.

We're going to talk about how to scale a restaurant company. Every restaurateur I ever talk with has dreams of taking one store, 2 shops, five shops, and turning it into something much biggerexpanding throughout the city, throughout the state, into numerous states, and ultimately national, even worldwide reach. It's not simple, especially in today's environment.

It's not a simple time to drive profitability and growth at the exact same time. How do you scale it and make it successful? Second, beyond innovation, how do you scale terrific groups?

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The very first concern I have for you, Jasonlook, you've done this twice now in the dining establishment industry. What are a few of the lessons you've discovered? What has your experience remained in regards to what it takes to truly drive success in broadening dining establishments? Tell me a little about your path, what you experienced along the way, and perhaps some of the more difficult lessons you found out.

We talked a bit before we started about LinkedIn, and I've got a post teed as much as follow this next week about what the playbook is likepoint by pointfor growing a service. To me, among the key things, and I feel extremely fortunate, is that both brand names I've been included with are unique.

And there's nothing precisely like Chop Shop in regards to what we're finishing with a big, diverse menu. Many brands today are very singularly focused in terms of what they're using from a food product. I seem like we started at a benefit with both brand names by having something special that filled a niche nobody else was doing.

Since it's just more difficult to stand out when there are 10, 20, 50 ideas within a 2- or three-mile radius attempting to do the specific same thing. So a great deal of it starts with the brand name. Does your brand have something distinct that no one else is doing? That's uncommon.

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The second thingI originated from a financing background, so a lot of my learnings are more financing and data-driven versus a great deal of early start-up restaurateurs who are imaginative types. They like the food, they built the menu, they developed the brand name. I most likely could not do that from scratch. But if you offered me something that has all those elements in place, I can take it from there and put the playbook in location.

They do not know their breakeven sales. They do not understand how margin enhances as sales boost. I've seen so numerous companies where the numbers simply do not work.

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If you don't have those two things, you should not be building shops. Yeah, possibly both? Since as I hear your description, you've highlighted three things: execution, brand distinction, and monetary practicality. You've got to start with execution. If you do not have an operating model that works, broadening it just multiplies issues.

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Second, you need an engaging brand name or distinct concept that resonates with clients. And third, the math needs to work. If you do not understand your unit economics, your fixed and variable costs, you may be expanding blind and losing money. Precisely. And another crucial lesson is about going into brand-new markets.

When we expanded to Dallas, I anticipated new shops to do 5070% of Phoenix sales in the first year. Too lots of operators presume new markets will open at full volume day one.