Restaurant technology doesn't fail in isolation. When one part of the ecosystem breaks, the operator feels all of it.

Toby Malbec, one of the restaurant industry's most respected technology leaders, joins Michael Beck and Chad Horn on the ChatGTM Podcast to talk about partnerships, trust, restaurant technology ecosystems and why vendors need to stop making operators referee their problems.

After decades advising and leading technology strategy for brands including Subway and Church's Texas Chicken, Toby now serves as VP of Partnerships at Qu, where he's bringing an operator-first perspective to the vendor side of the table.

His philosophy is simple: restaurant managers aren't IT integrators. When POS, payments, loyalty, inventory, digital ordering or another system fails, operators shouldn't have to figure out whose fault it is.

The partners should.

Toby calls it removing the F-word: friction.

The conversation explores what separates an integration from a true partnership, why relationships still matter in technology buying, what startups get wrong when approaching enterprise partners, and why best-of-breed technology only works when vendors take shared responsibility for the operator experience.

And when asked who wins the future of restaurant technology, Toby's answer cuts through the AI noise:

“Embrace humanity and leverage AI where applicable.”

CHAPTERS

00:00 Welcome to ChatGTM
01:24 Meet Toby Malbec
02:45 Toby's Move From Church's to Qu
04:49 Seeing Restaurant Tech From Both Sides
06:44 Who Owns the Problem When Tech Breaks?
07:07 Stop Making Operators Referee Vendors
08:12 Removing the F-Word: Friction
08:55 Why Qu Invested in Partnerships
11:29 Partnerships Are Built Between People
14:40 Getting Vendors to Play Together
17:12 When the Operator Pays for Bad Partnerships
18:39 Prioritizing the Restaurant Tech Ecosystem
20:11 Consulting Without Having a Dog in the Hunt
20:57 What Startups Get Wrong Approaching Qu
21:56 Finding the Right Integration Partners
22:26 Could Qu Become a Restaurant Tech Incubator?
23:43 Building a Partnership Mindset Across Qu
24:06 Balancing Profit With the Long Game
26:05 Best-of-Breed Without the Headaches
26:19 Are RFPs Still Working?
27:00 Capabilities Get You In. Relationships Matter.
27:58 Why Buying Restaurant Tech Isn't Just About Price
29:28 How Do You Measure Partnership Success?
31:00 When the Market Says a Partnership Isn't Working
31:12 Bringing Consulting Into Partnerships
32:19 Why Toby Chose Qu
32:45 Why Qu Is at an Inflection Point
34:22 A-Players Still Have to Fit Together
34:39 Rapid Fire With Toby
34:53 One Quality Every Great Partner Needs
34:54 Handshake or Contract?
34:59 What Instantly Earns or Loses Trust?
35:15 A Restaurant Brand Toby Admires
35:29 Why Toby Has a “Crush” on P. Terry's
36:11 The Future of Restaurant Technology
36:32 Why ChatGTM Wanted This Conversation
37:02 Giving Back to the Restaurant Industry
37:29 Closing Thoughts
38:49 Operators Rule

Where should responsibility fall when multiple technology vendors are involved and something breaks? Tell us in the comments.

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Restaurant back-office technology has spent decades telling operators what already happened.

David Cantu believes it should tell them what to do next.

David, CEO of Craftable and co-founder of HotSchedules, returns to ChatGTM with Michael Beck and Chad Horn to talk about rebuilding restaurant back office around the people actually running restaurants.

His analogy nails the shift: the old back office is a rearview mirror. The new back office should be a GPS.

That means forecasting sales, determining what to order and prep, planning staffing, identifying leakage and surfacing the few actions a manager can take before the opportunity is gone.

The conversation goes deep into restaurant profitability, technology adoption, inventory, waste, forecasting, AI and David's belief that we need to connect managers emotionally to margins.

And despite building heavily with AI, when asked what's currently overhyped in restaurant technology, David's answer is simple: AI.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Welcome to ChatGTM
01:53 David Cantu Returns
04:13 What Followed David Home From Prosper?
05:34 Why Great Leaders Never Stop Learning
06:00 Removing Friction From a Manager's Day
08:09 The Power of Connection
10:47 Developing the Next Generation of Leaders
12:00 Removing Back-Office Friction
12:49 Why Back-Office Implementations Fail
14:17 Connecting Managers Emotionally to Margins
15:10 Are Your Highest-Sales Stores Really Your Best?
16:14 The Fear of Another Tech Implementation
17:13 Making Restaurant Tech Implementation Work
18:26 The Items Driving Restaurant Profitability
19:57 What's Changed in Restaurant Technology?
21:26 Restaurants Are Still Using Fax Machines?!
22:21 Modernizing Restaurant Workflows
23:21 The Restaurant Ordering Problem
24:15 What David Learned Checking Deliveries
25:09 How Much Purchased Food Never Reaches the Plate?
25:37 Why Restaurant PARs Are Outdated
27:02 From 60K to Nearly 1M Lines of Code
28:15 Finding Money in Any Economy
29:00 Adoption, Adoption, Adoption
30:34 Stop Burying Managers in Dashboards
32:11 From Rearview Mirror to Restaurant GPS
32:49 What Prescriptive Restaurant Tech Looks Like
34:00 Forecasting Sales, Orders, Prep & Staffing
35:34 Building Forecasts Operators Trust
36:32 How Accurate Can Forecasting Become?
38:55 When Is It Time to Leave Legacy Tech?
39:29 Why Generic AI Isn't Enough
41:28 Turning Restaurant Data Into Action
42:46 Finding Voids, Comps & Hidden Problems
43:40 Building Technology for the Front Line
44:06 Are Managers Getting Their Share?
44:58 A Million Ways Restaurants Lose Margin
46:45 Why David Is Going to FSTEC
48:56 Why David Doesn't Obsess Over Competitors
49:42 Rapid Fire
50:02 AI Assistant or AI Agent?
50:14 The Metric Operators Don't Understand
51:07 The Most Overhyped Restaurant Tech: AI
51:18 David's Leadership Advice
52:54 The Future of Restaurant Operations
53:20 Stop Selling AI. Tell Operators What It Does.
55:01 Where to Find David & Craftable
56:00 Why ChatGTM Has These Conversations
56:56 Closing

Is your restaurant technology telling you what happened, or helping you decide what to do next? Tell us below.

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Restaurant operators don't need another piece of technology. They need technology that makes them money, saves them money, or gives them time back.

Hugh Guill and Stephen Klein, co-founders of Saivory, join Michael Beck and Chad Horn on the ChatGTM Podcast to talk about what happens when AI moves beyond answering questions and actually starts doing the work.

Hugh brings an important perspective: he's not a technologist searching for a restaurant problem. He's an operator and partner in Fajita Pete's, where the realities of catering, third-party delivery, customer acquisition and restaurant margins helped inspire what became Saivory.

The conversation gets into Agentic AI, restaurant marketing, first-party data, AI ordering, digital hospitality and why restaurants need to regain control of the customer relationship.

Hugh explains how Fajita Pete's flipped its order mix from roughly 40% online to 63% online, why growing a CRM means nothing unless brands actually use it, and why there is no AI "silver bullet" for restaurant growth.

They also explore a much bigger shift: AI agents that continuously analyze marketing performance, identify opportunities, recommend actions and execute approved changes instead of waiting for someone to dig through dashboards.

Hugh's prediction for the AI era? Restaurants will win when they fully adopt AI agents as part of their employee base and team capacity.

IN THIS EPISODE

• Agentic AI and autonomous restaurant marketing
• First-party vs. third-party ordering
• AI-powered catering and conversational ordering
• Turning customer data into profitable sales
• Why restaurant websites still matter
• AI agents as digital employees
• Reducing dependence on third-party platforms
• Why there is no AI silver bullet
• What restaurant operators should actually be doing with AI

CHAPTERS

00:00 Welcome to ChatGTM
01:21 Meet Saivory
03:48 Meet Hugh Guill
06:44 From Restaurant Operator to AI Founder
07:02 The Problem That Started Saivory
09:14 How AI Simplifies Restaurant Ordering
11:10 Why Operator Experience Matters
12:30 Building Technology That Helps Restaurants Win
17:11 The Truth About AI Silver Bullets
18:55 How Fajita Pete's Flipped to 63% Online Orders
23:35 What Restaurants Give Away to Third Parties
27:15 When Your Own Website Works Against You
29:54 Where Restaurants Have an AI Advantage
32:41 The Rise of Agentic Restaurant Marketing
34:32 "I Don't Need Another Damn Piece of Technology"
36:38 AI Agents as Digital Employees
39:01 Why Great Restaurant Tech Companies Still Fail
44:04 The Saivory Opportunity
45:54 Building an Army of AI Agents
48:06 Why Restaurant Partnerships Still Matter
50:17 What Operators Will Be Asking About AI at FSTEC
52:07 Rapid Fire with Hugh Guill
55:39 How Restaurants Win the AI Era

Would you trust an AI agent as a member of your marketing team? Tell us in the comments.

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