Beverages have become big business as boba, dirty sodas, coffee and kombucha take center stage on the franchising market. Juice It Up, which has been selling cold and raw-pressed juices, smoothies, açaí bowls. toasts and bagels for more than 30 years, has been an industry leader.

In this episode of the Restaurant Operator Podcast, host Mandy Detwiler, editor of QSRweb and Pizza Marketplace, talks to Susan Taylor, president and CEO of Juice It Up, based in Southern California, about how the brand has been leading the beverage market. Juice It Up recently opened its 100th unit in Gardnerville, Nevada.

Taylor said the definition of a meal replacement has changed since the launch of the juice brand, and smoothies and juices are no longer sweet treats after a workout. Instead, they're nutritious and fill the needs of those looking for more protein, living vegan lifestyles or needing fuel for the day.

"It's interesting the way that the segment has grown," Taylor said in the podcast. "Beverages as a complete segment (includes) everything from coffee to smoothies and juice bars. I think that consumers today are much more sophisticated and really looking for different things to be able to fuel their lifestyle that has kind of expanded the category.

"Depending on where you are in your health and wellness lifestyle journey, you can come in and you can do a fresh-made order juice using beets, celery, carrots, ginger, turmeric, anything that you want to be able to have in that, or you can build your own. And there's a pretty dedicated core of customers that really look for that."

Gen Z and millennial consumers have been shaping beverage trends as of late.

The generations that are coming up now look at beverages in a totally different way from just want something right now," Taylor added. "There's an experience. They're just they're thinking about what it provides to them from a nutritional standpoint to just how they feel like they're treating themselves as well, too."

To learn more about how Juice It Up is innovating the beverage industry, listen to the podcast in its entirety.

In this episode of the Restaurant Operator Podcast, host Mandy Detwiler, editor of Pizza Marketplace and QSRweb, talks with Brian Simowitz, president, and Andie Smirl, director of franchise sales, for Houston TX Hot Chicken. The Nashville hot chicken concept launched during COVID in 2020 in Las Vegas. The brand now has 31 units.

Part of what draws diners to the concept is its electric brand energy. With more than 400,000 social media followers, Houston TX Hot Chicken seems to be striking a nerve with consumers.

"The energy that you get from that level of social media followers that are engaging with our brand on a daily basis is unbelievable. So, you know, and it gives us a lot of relevance with new franchisees coming in as well, because they look at it and go, man, this brand is crazy," Simowitz said during the podcast. "And I'll share with you, quite honestly, we get a lot of potential franchise leads just from our social media and how big that social media footprint is."

Smirl joined the brand when it had already sold more than 100 units and said a lot of the brand's leads are truly organic.

"A lot of our leads are truly organic," she said during the podcast. "They are coming in because (potential franchisees) either tried the food or they've seen our social media. They've seen our content, either on LinkedIn or Instagram, something like that. So we're really lucky that we don't really have to sell that part of it. It's already really exciting to just see the brand. So I think that we get to be pretty strategic in kind of how we decide to grow.

"We don't want to just throw one restaurant across the country where our support is in Vegas. We want to be available and ideally in the same time zone for a little while at least where we can just kind of strategically grow to best support our franchisees. So we're pretty lucky in that and we don't take that for granted, but we want to be really smart about who we partner with."

To learn more about how Houston TX Hot Chicken attracts top-tier franchisees, what the brand's leaders look for in franchise partners and what the future holds for the company, listen to the podcast in its entirety.

In the high-pressure environment of a professional kitchen, communication is the invisible thread that prevents a service from unraveling into chaos.

A "call and response" system ensures the front-of-house servers and the back-of-house line cooks remain perfectly synchronized; when a lead expeditor calls out an order, the collective "heard" from the kitchen staff confirms that every component, from the medium-rare steak to the allergy-sensitive salad, is being tracked in real-time. Beyond the verbal, non-verbal cues like a simple nod or the strategic placement of a physical ticket are essential for maintaining a rhythmic flow during the "rush," turning a group of individuals into a singular, cohesive unit.

For QSR and fast casual employees, there's help in the communication department. Zenzap is an app allowing communication that can be controlled by management and works between staff members.

In this podcast, Editor Mandy Detweiler talks to Guy Weiss, co-founder and CEO of Zenzap, and Shawn Walchef, owner of Cali BBQ in San Diego.

Walchef uses Zenzap at Cali BBQ. "I think one of the most important things for a modern restaurateur, a modern business owner is to have tight communications with your teams, knowing that there's so many different apps that you need to be on. You have to make sure that the most important communication that you do with your management, that you do with your front of the house staff, back of the house staff happens seamlessly and preferably it happens in a secure environment," he shared during the podcast.

Weiss points out that when an employee leaves the company, he or she can be removed from the app so as not to take proprietary information with him or her.

"I think that onboarding and offboarding is a huge challenge," Weiss said. "And when using group chats, it's just impossible to onboard and offboard, as Shawn mentioned. And there is also risk from a business perspective. Think about one of your cooks, a chef, is leaving and going on his journey. And he's basically taking all of your IP, all of your recipes, all of your knowledge.

"You can leverage it in somewhere else because he's still a part of the group chats. And even if you ask him nicely to leave those group chats, all the data until that point of time stays with him, back to his private cloud, and he's there forever. ... I think to top the productivity side of it is you will never open many group chats for different contexts, even with the same team, because it's already overwhelming."

To learn more about Zenzap and how it can help your restaurant, listen to the podcast in its entirety.

With beef prices climbing — up nearly 60% in the last decade, according to industry veterans —fast casual operators are facing a margin squeeze. The solution to stabilizing food costs while meeting consumer demand for variety may lie in an under-leveraged protein: pork.

In this episode of the "Restaurant Operator Podcast," host Cherryh Cansler sits down with Dr. Kristin Hicks-Roof of the National Pork Board and Eddie Flores Jr., co-founder of the 235-unit franchise L&L Hawaiian Barbecue. Together, they explore why pork is emerging as a strategic pivot for brands looking to differentiate their menus and protect their bottom lines.

Flores shares real-world insights on how items like Kalua pork and Spam have acted as economic stabilizers for his franchise system amidst market volatility. Conversely, Hicks-Roof breaks down the nutritional science, explaining how operators can market pork to health-conscious consumers looking for nutrient-dense options.

What listeners can learn:

• The Margin Opportunity: How substituting or blending pork can alleviate the pressure of rising beef and chicken costs.
• Global Flavor Trends: How to leverage pork’s versatility to tap into popular international cuisines, from Hawaiian "Lau Lau" (pork wrapped in taro leaves) to Filipino "Pork Tocino."
• The "Carrier" Concept: Strategies for using pork—like bacon or crumbles—as a flavor driver to increase sales of high-margin vegetable sides.
• Combating Menu Monotony: How introducing new cuts helps operators avoid "protein fatigue" among regular customers.

“Pork fits smack dab in the middle,” Hicks-Roof said during the episode. “It not only provides that nutrition, but it also provides that traditional deliciousness.”

Click here to listen to the full episode and learn how to rethink the center of the plate.

Dirty Dough owner Bennett Maxwell knows cookies. After all, his brand has 50 flavors and a simple model.

In this episode of the Restaurant Operator Podcast, host Mandy Detwiler, editor of Pizza Marketplace and QSRweb, talks to Maxwell about his operations, the cookie wars he battled and the marketing strategies that make Dirty Dough a success.

When asked what advice he would give to another restaurant or hospitality start up that might face unexpected legal or PR crises early on, Maxwell said he would be as open, transparent and authentic as possible.

When he was slapped with a lawsuit by a competing brand, Maxwell recommended to "get business advice from business people, get legal advice from legal people. But, if you're in that scenario, I would just be as open and transparent about everything."

Hear the cookie wars story and how Maxwell came out victorious by listening to the entire podcast.

In this episode of the Restaurant Operator Podcast, podcast host Mandy Detwiler, editor of Pizza Marketplace and QSRweb, talks to Jim Nusbaum, CEO of Barry Bagels. Nusbaum shares the brand's origin story, its expansion strategy into Texas, and the unique hub and spoke model that supports franchisees. He discusses the importance of employee culture, maximizing revenue streams through catering and wholesale, and ensuring consistency across locations. Nusbaum emphasizes the support provided to new franchisees and the qualities sought in potential partners, highlighting the investment opportunities within the brand.

Barry Bagels was started by a 21-year-old operator named Barry Greenblatt who along with his partner, bagel-maker Peter Johnson, opened their first location in Sylvania, Ohio in 1972.

Since then the brand has grown to Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and a recent development deal signed for 30 units in Texas.

Nusbaum talked about the hub-and-spoke model in which the "hub" is the first store in any market with about 1,600 to 2,200 square feet. That store has the bagel-making capabilities. The bagels are then delivered to the "spoke" locations.

"Spoke locations, which need no HVAC, no walk-in cooler (and) no walk-in freezer, can be built for a fraction of the cost of the hub location. And since we're not baking there, you don't need a grease trap or the HVAC or anything like that," Nusbaum said.

To learn more about Barry Bagels' operations, click the link at the top of the page.

In this episode of Restaurant Operator, host Cherryh Cansler, publisher of Fast Casual, sits down with Luke Wilwerding, VP of North America Sales of Elo Touch, sponsors of both this episode and the Fast Casual Top 100 Movers & Shakers report.

Together, they explore how restaurant technology is transforming every stage of the guest experience from self-order kiosks and drive-thru innovation to AI-powered kitchen management.

Wilwerding explains how Elo's platform approach is helping operators boost speed, accuracy and flexibility, whether it's a bustling fast casual kitchen or a multi-channel ordering environment. From interactive displays to AI-enhanced voice ordering and computer vision for accuracy, Elo's innovations are redefining what's possible for restaurant efficiency.

As Wilwerding notes, the walls between fast casual, QSR and casual dining are crumbling, and it's technology that's breaking them down. The future of restaurant operations, he says, belongs to the brands that embrace innovation, not resist it.

Sponsored by Elo Touch, this conversation offers a glimpse into how top-performing brands are using tech to deliver faster, smarter, and more personalized dining experiences.

In this episode of the Restaurant Operator Podcast, host Mandy Detwiler, editor of QSRweb.com and Pizza Marketplace, talks with Or Peleg, managing partner of Tel Aviv Grill in the Los Angeles area.

Tel Aviv Grill began 11 years ago as a small kosher market making shawarma, skewers and sandwiches in the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles. "And, very quickly, it became a very tangible part of the community. Everybody in the area knew about it and it kind of grew out of that market," Peleg said.

Peleg came on a managing partner about five years ago.

The original restaurant quickly grew too big for several locations and now has three units.

Consistency has been the brand's biggest challenge.

"I don't want somebody to have like a shawarma in one location and then a couple of days later to go to one of our other locations is completely different. It kind of breaks the entire purpose," Peleg said. "So it's very hands-on, it's very time-consuming and it takes a long time to make sure your team is on board and knows exactly how to prepare and present the product the way we would like."

To learn more about Tel Aviv Grill, listen to the podcast in its entirety.