#20: The Brix Holdings Playbook for Growing a Restaurant Empire | Sherif Mityas, Brix Holdings

Daniel Tsentsiper (00:01.406) Welcome to the show. How are you doing today? Sherif Mityas (00:03.356) I'm doing well, thanks for having me on. Daniel Tsentsiper (00:05.744) Thank you so much for joining. Where are you calling in from today? Sherif Mityas (00:09.47) I'm in Dallas, Texas, the headquarters of Bricks Holdings. Daniel Tsentsiper (00:13.59) Amazing. Last time I was in Dallas, I think that was for FS Tech and that was almost a year ago. So I always get excited to go back to Dallas. It feels like everything in Dallas is either a restaurant with a drive-through or a gun range. It's kind of like the two, there's no in-betweens there, but I'm really excited to discuss with you all sorts of topics around your kind of growth journey with Friendlyz as the concept and also Learn more about bricks as an entity and how you guys are able to, kind of navigate with multiple concepts under one roof. So very excited to kind of jump in the conversation. Always first like to ask my guests to, you know, tell our audience to live about themselves. How did you get into the restaurant industry? And then we'll kind of go from there. Sherif Mityas (01:01.458) Yeah, well, I guess my first foray to the restaurant industry when I was 15, I was flipping burgers for a summer job up in Wisconsin where I grew up. And then, you know, obviously went on and did a number of other things, mostly in the retail space for majority of my career. And then was also consulting to the restaurant industry for a while. And then joined the TGI Fridays group down here in Dallas. First, there's their CIO and Chief Strategy Officer, and then took on the added role of Chief Experience Officer, which allowed me to take on kind of everything that touches the guest from marketing to culinary innovation. And then had this opportunity to join Bricks Holdings at a time where we had about five brands at that point, Friendly's being the largest one, the chain in the Northeast. And then we've picked up a few brands since then. now we're, currently sitting with eight brands, about 300, some locations across 40 plus states. And, yeah, everything from friendlies, which is a 90 year old, family dining, casual sit down restaurant on the East coast to, our frozen yogurt concepts, red mango and orange leaf. we have smoothie factory plus kitchen. we just acquired last year, clean juice. which is the only USDA certified organic juice bar chain in the country. And then we have Humble Donuts, Pizza Juke Box and Super Salad just to round us out. So that's a little bit about my background and Bricks. Daniel Tsentsiper (02:38.413) That's a wide variety of concepts you have under one roof. I would love to kind of dig deeper into understanding how you pick brands, but let's first take a step back. So Bricks Holding, did you guys start off as a franchisee of Friendly's or did you guys come in and acquire the brand? Do you guys grow the brands in-house or you guys come in and acquire? Curious about that. Sherif Mityas (03:01.372) Yeah, we, we acquire. so the first, the first brand we acquired, a number of years before my time was red mango. That was kind of the first brand. And then there was acquisitions, acquisitions from that point. and then we actually bought friendlies out of bankruptcy. believe it or not a month before the pandemic hit. and so great time. Yeah. To, to join, and to get a big casual sit down dining chain. but no, we acquired them. Daniel Tsentsiper (03:03.125) Okay. Daniel Tsentsiper (03:12.308) Okay. Daniel Tsentsiper (03:16.896) I see. Daniel Tsentsiper (03:22.089) Lucky you. Sherif Mityas (03:31.114) at the time they had corporate run restaurants as well as franchise locations. we have since refranchised the corporate locations and now all that the whole brand is just franchised. we normally act franchise or yeah. So that's really what we are. Our focus is, is to be the franchise or, for a portfolio group, allows us to, you know, kind of create, basically the economies of scale that's required from a portfolio perspective. Daniel Tsentsiper (03:43.849) really? Sherif Mityas (03:58.63) and still provide what each of our brands and our franchisee partners need, you know, by brand going forward. Daniel Tsentsiper (04:02.677) Mm. Daniel Tsentsiper (04:05.896) Right. That's a good point. think, you know, we've seen different brands over the years kind of evolved from having almost like an equal split of corporate to franchisees locations. And then over the years, we've seen kind of the franchisers move away from owning their own locations to make the economies of scale work out, as you mentioned. How do you stay connected with your franchisees? That's one of the things I hear a lot about is even if corporate gets their gets their game out of owning their own restaurants. maybe have one or two that they like to run so they can stay in touch with the customers and also with their franchisees. How do you guys stay connected? Sherif Mityas (04:48.188) Yeah. So we have, for each of our brands, we have a very, great kind of core group of advisory council members. So it's a handful of our, you know, kind of core experience, franchise partners, and there are eyes and ears, right? So there, those conversations we're having every week, every month with that group, what's going on, what's going on? What are you hearing from your customers? What are you hearing from your team members? You know, what processes are working or not working? So they're. They're really kind of a, call it an extension of our corporate kind of governance. And so things that we want to roll out, they obviously pilot for us. Things that they're hearing that they bring to us, we should be thinking about this or that because this is what's going on on the ground. So we utilize those advisory councils almost as an extension of our corporate team and those franchisees. And we're able to use their stores. not only as test beds, but as learning centers as well, to be able to stay that, to your point, connected to each of the brands and their specific requirements and needs, really, in terms of the franchise community going forward. Daniel Tsentsiper (05:59.114) That's actually a really good point is for my audience of franchisers that are listening, having your franchisees be part of the decision making is crucial. They can't be sitting in the sidelines waiting for you to make those decisions. think I remember, believe you spoke at FS Tech around how you bring franchisees into the discussion for making technology adoption decisions. Kind of maybe if you could share, of walk me through that process when you guys decided to overhaul your tech stack at Friendlies. How did you bring the franchisees into the decision and how did you frame those initiatives to them to get the green light from them as well? Sherif Mityas (06:48.786) Yeah, I think, know, for especially technology investments that tend to be large, right. and you, you, it's different than trying to sell a marketing campaign, right? Where you say, if you spend this, we'll be on the radio, we'll be, we'll be in print, we'll be on social and you see a return almost immediately. Right. From a technology perspective, you got to sit and go, okay, what are some of the things that would make X easier? And X can be anything, making your GM's life easier, making your team members life easier, making your guests experience better, making you make more money within your four walls, right? Operationally, efficiently creating something that makes the needle move. And so you got to start with that and really understand from a franchisee perspective in their shoes, what would be important to him or her, right? What would make me want to spend a dollar, right? On something that I don't know about. I'm not sure about. You're trying to sell me. have to understand from their perspective, if this call it technology can save you a dollar here or make you a more, a dollar there that let's have a conversation. Right. And so that's, starts that with what's in it for them. What's in it for them from a return perspective, from a make my life better or more profitable perspective, then they have to be part of that decision process. Right. So. Like any group, have five people that could potentially do that technology, right? Well, here's the pros and cons of each five. In fact, I want you to sit in on the sessions when we get demos, right? I want you to be part of that process so that you're understanding the same thing we are so that we all hopefully get to the same decision that this partner with this solution makes the most sense and will deliver the return on investment that we're all going to be looking for. And then they're your pilot group, right? They're the ones where you're setting up the sandbox. They're the ones that are providing input on, I'd like to see this different or this changed. And once you make them part of that process, then when you're going to the full franchisee community, it's not me selling it, right? It's my franchise advisory board saying, no, we were part of this. This works. It's been in my store for a month now, three months now. And this is the right thing to do. Sherif Mityas (09:11.058) Right? And so that just makes obviously the entire process a little bit more, I'd say pain, painless, it makes it a little bit easier, and having that connection and having them along throughout the process. Daniel Tsentsiper (09:19.559) Yeah. Daniel Tsentsiper (09:24.165) Right, right. You get some buy-in, right? And a lot of the times the franchisees, you know, they talk amongst themselves and they're very loyal to one another and they respect the, you know, they respect the advice, they respect the introductions they make to technology vendors. I think that's key in the business. And one of the more exciting things that I saw that y'all were working on was this pilot for a fast casual concept for friendlies. I don't know if it's been Sherif Mityas (09:38.494) Thank you. Daniel Tsentsiper (09:53.929) If you guys have been running this at scale or if it's still remaining a pilot, curious, how did you think about turning or potentially turning Friendlies into a fast casual brand? And then also back to our previous conversation, how did the franchisees react to that pilot and how were they involved? Sherif Mityas (10:15.89) Yeah. So, you know, I think the pilot originated from, we're seeing a changing demographic, right? So lots of consumers now that have shifted to convenience, speed. I don't have time to sit down. Right. And so, and you see that, right. And some of the fastest growing, you know, brands out there, they're in the fast casual space, even more than QSR. And so we're like, how would you think about taking a friendlies 90 year old brand that's Daniel Tsentsiper (10:22.407) Absolutely. Daniel Tsentsiper (10:38.759) Absolutely. Sherif Mityas (10:45.586) you know, based on bringing the family and sitting around a table for an hour and a half and turning it into a fast casual. So like all, you know, great, but maybe crazy ideas, you got to pilot it. And so we, we took a, we found a spot, built a prototype fast casual, with the drive through the whole, the whole, the whole kit and caboodle and yeah. And, and tried it. Right. And so the interesting thing, the feedback he got is from the old, the folks that are Daniel Tsentsiper (11:06.535) Go shebang. Sherif Mityas (11:15.274) so inbred into the brand that what what friendlies means to them is so ingrained they hated it. Daniel Tsentsiper (11:20.166) and Daniel Tsentsiper (11:23.877) What does it mean? What does friendly means? What does friendlies mean to them? Sherif Mityas (11:27.364) It means bringing the family, spending an hour plus, having the server, having the experience, having the big ice cream sundaes, everything right there, family dining out, right? To go up to a counter and to go through and then take a number and have some, it was completely alien. It was not the Friendly's experience. They hated it. Now, a whole new demographic had heard about Friendly's. Daniel Tsentsiper (11:38.695) Okay. Sherif Mityas (11:55.23) Friendly's ice cream, right? That's the only thing they heard about, right? This was like, this is great. I can come in, grab my ice cream, grab maybe a melt, some fries, and I'm out. And so, okay, good learning, right? I probably don't wanna put these things in the Northeast where there's lots of Friendly's and consumers that know Friendly's for a certain occasion and a certain purpose. But. Daniel Tsentsiper (12:14.459) Hmm. Sherif Mityas (12:22.248) There's a lot of brand recognition and name recognition for friendlies outside the Northeast, where there's a lot more of, let's call it a younger demographic that this concept and this model actually may do very well. It allows us to be in a smaller box, better unit economics. And that's when you get to the franchisee discussion. It's, I'm not saying we're not going to be building big friendlies. In fact, we just built one and opened one in Orlando, but this gives us another alternative. Daniel Tsentsiper (12:27.175) you Sherif Mityas (12:51.218) Right? This gives us another model that may work in different real estate in different parts of the country, where some of those franchisees may want to open an operator friendlies, but not spend X number of dollars. They want to spend half that and get that friendlies experience and extend it to another part of the country. So that's the balance that you have to play. And that's really for every brand. You can't give up who you are. Right? You can't, you can't just walk away from years. Daniel Tsentsiper (13:10.811) and Sherif Mityas (13:20.71) of what consumers know you for. And so that's why you got to be really careful when you start thinking about changing formats. Maybe the right place at the right time for the right demographic, works, but it's not a wholesale change. Daniel Tsentsiper (13:34.671) that. And so how did you keep the Friendly's ethos alive in those fast casual pilot, right? How did you keep the brand and what it's known for in this new format, new environment? Sherif Mityas (13:48.796) Yeah, the key starts with families and kids, right? Families is kind of known for families and kids. And so you can't give up kind of that fun atmosphere, even if it's a fast casual, right? There's lots to be balloons. There still has to be lots of fun things on the walls and sprinkles and ice cream flavors and people moving around with big Sundays in their hands. Right. And so that type of kind of core fun family joy of ice cream has to be in regardless of the format. And so that's what we really pushed. And when we introduced little things that you could do in a fast casual format that would work like ice cream sandwiches, right? So more of a grab and go versus sitting with a big glass goblet of ice cream, put it in between two cookies and you're out the door. Right? So you can still kind of keep what is known for friendlies, but in doing it in different way, even from a menu engineering perspective to make it work for a different format. Daniel Tsentsiper (14:46.662) And did you take away certain elements? Are you still able to get that large ice cream sundae at the fast casual location as well? Okay. Got it. Sherif Mityas (14:53.458) You can't, yeah, you still gotta keep the core, right? Because if someone's coming in looking for their hunk of chunk of PB fudge Sunday, you gotta have it on the menu. Daniel Tsentsiper (15:00.256) Right. Yeah, I think that's such an amazing experiment that you ran. I think we've, I love this industry because we are able to run these experiments and see what works and see what doesn't and then sort of incorporate it into the growth of the business. think a good example recently is the recent headlines with Cosmix, right? With McDonald's, they decided to close down that pilot. And on the surface, it looks like it didn't go well, right? you know, they're closing it down, but they learn how they can, it, how they can operationally include that into their core business. And if it verified that this is a model that's successful with the younger, demographic and it's, keeping that, you know, keeping that long-term view and in the short term, you know, maybe taking a little bit of a hit in the name of research and development, right? Like I'm in the tech industry, we spend millions and millions of our entire PNL is just. a massive line item for R and D, but we use that as a way to, um, you know, develop new products, innovate and compete. So I commend you for, for doing that. And I think, um, I, I, so I'm assuming you guys are going to be opening up new, um, fast casual locations in the future. Which markets are you targeting? Sherif Mityas (16:17.406) Yeah. Again, probably more, let's call it west of the Mississippi, right? Some maybe in the, the, in the south. But we've also got plans for a lot of the kind of traditional bigger box sit down restaurants. You know, probably three to five of those in the next call it 12 to 18 months. Daniel Tsentsiper (16:23.684) Okay. Daniel Tsentsiper (16:38.349) Very, very cool. Let's take a step back and want to learn more about Bricks as a platform. What are the types of brands and operators that you're looking for when deciding to invest in a new concept? What is on your radar? Sherif Mityas (16:54.684) Yeah. I mean, we're, it's really a couple of things that we look for. you know, first at its core is like any restaurant chain, the food, the menu, right? It's, it's gotta be good. you know, you can have all the bells and whistles you want, around a brand new hot chain, but if, if consumers go there and they don't like actually the core food and beverage that's being served, it's not going to last. at its core, the bones, what I call the bones of the brand have to be, have to be solid. craveable food and Second, think there has to be some unique hook, right? There has to be something that sets it apart. for instance, when we bought Clean Juice, there's lots of juice bars out there, right? This is the only USDA organic, right? It's the seal on everything that goes out the door. No one else has that. Not Nectar, not Jamba, not Smoothie King. No one else has that. And so there's a unique hook that creates, again, a consumer or a guest affinity to the brand. That's very important to us. What's different about this versus all the other competitors out there in that space or sector. And then third, to your point, it's gotta be the, because we buy franchised, right? Brands is the franchisees. So we go and speak to lots of franchisees before we acquire a brand. We understand their passion, their commitment, their focus. How are they as operators? How are they in their community? Daniel Tsentsiper (18:00.388) Thank you. Sherif Mityas (18:22.254) What are they doing to help grow their brand? Right. And so that's, that's kind of the three legs of the stool. Right. So if you've got something that's just great that people crave, if you have passionate franchisees and you have this unique hook, that makes people think of you before someone else. so you'll notice I didn't, I didn't mention a cuisine type. I didn't mention a size. didn't mention, you know, part of a geographic area. Daniel Tsentsiper (18:41.156) Right. So it seems like you are very then selective with the types of deals that come to your table. Sherif Mityas (18:51.652) It's these other attributes that we look for when we look to acquire new brands. Sherif Mityas (19:03.622) We are, and we have to be right. Cause I mean, you know, the, the big guys, right. The inspires of the world and the to go foods. mean, they, they're, they're going off and buying Duncan and Sonic and, know, and those guys, and they're a different scale, but the same principles apply, right. For their portfolio group to work, those guys like us, you have to, you have to ensure that from a cultural perspective, the fit works behind the scenes, right. Because everything below, what I call below the skin. Daniel Tsentsiper (19:15.373) Bye. Daniel Tsentsiper (19:30.627) Thanks. Sherif Mityas (19:33.522) that guests don't see has to be common, right? For this economy of scale to work. So we have one supply chain team. I don't have eight. I have one technology team, right? All the brands, I have one technology team, not eight. I have one finance team, not eight, right? So you've got to have, you've got to be able to create that kind of synergy behind the scenes. And that's so the brands have to have some fit. And for us, it's kind of cultural. Daniel Tsentsiper (19:41.919) I assume across all the brands, across all the brands, right. Daniel Tsentsiper (19:51.798) in Sherif Mityas (20:03.094) connection and, and, and how they work together. Now, things that guests see like the marketing, that's very brand specific, right? The friendliest marketing team is not doing clean juice, right? Those are very different guests, very different value propositions. And so those things you have to keep separate because the guests view them as separate, but no one cares that we have one person buying strawberries for eight brands. I don't need a friendlies only buyer of strawberries. That's the difference. Daniel Tsentsiper (20:35.435) I see. I find that, I find that so fascinating. My, you know, my first role out of college was, was actually working in one of these large conglomerates. worked at Clorox and I saw how this massive engine was able to run all these different brands. And in some ways they, yeah, they had an amazing supply chain. That's what they're known for. They had amazing manufacturing, but they also learn how to respect each of the different brands. Right. And, some, they, they bought out, birds bees, the, the lipstick, a lip balm. company and the culture of that team, while they did share a lot of the infrastructure behind the scenes was very birds bees esque versus the team that was running the charcoal division was completely different, right? They were more in touch with their market and their audience and behind the scenes you had Clorox as the engine that powered it. I find it really fascinating and how these brands can share the synergies of a platform like yours and grow even more profitably. I'm curious around when do you think it is the right time? And this is a very tough question. You can take it any way you want. When is the right time for a brand to get bought out? When is the right time for a brand to join a portfolio of brands? What is the of like the signals that you think are maybe give it a good, you know, good indicator that this might be the way forward. Sherif Mityas (21:59.966) Yeah, that's a, that's a good question. And, um, it's, it's tough. I know, cause we've, we've talked to many founders, um, that started right with one store, then they got to 20, then they got to 50. Um, and it's a hard decision, right? When, when do you kind of pull the cord? Um, you know, from my perspective, I think if a founder or someone that, that has, you know, a chain is, is really looking at it, you have to ask yourself a couple of questions. One is. If I really want this, my baby to grow, can someone else grow it faster, better than me? Am I at a point where I'm kind of tapped out because I don't have the infrastructure or I don't have the experience or I don't have the network or I don't have something that you believe you are now running into as a roadblock, right? So you ask yourself the question, I only open only, I only opened five new locations last year. And I could have opened 15 if it wasn't for X. Right. And so at that point you're like, well, there's other people that have X. Right. And so if I really want, if it's not about me and it's about this brand and I want them to grow and I want them to grow faster and better and be more successful, then when you start running into those roadblocks, when instead of opening 15, you could, you only open five when instead of getting 20 points of margin, you only deliver 10. Daniel Tsentsiper (23:00.332) X, yeah. Sherif Mityas (23:26.32) When it's those things that are driving a gap in what you believe as the owner of that chain, you should be achieving. And you ask yourself seriously, there's other people that could fill that gap. There's other people that could make, that could close that gap. Then it's time to look, then it's really time to put on an honest, you know, kind of, look in the mirror and say, someone else is now better equipped to take this to the next level. And it's time for me to exit. Daniel Tsentsiper (23:45.025) you Daniel Tsentsiper (23:55.549) I love them. Sherif Mityas (23:55.715) And that's always tough, but for the best, for the, if you're truly in it for the betterment of the brand, you make that decision. Daniel Tsentsiper (24:04.713) Right. I asked Jim, Jim Bayless a couple episodes ago, what it's like to come in and then work with that founder. We all know founders, especially of restaurant brands have an ego, have a personality, have things that they are very Sherif Mityas (24:16.402) Yep. Yes. Daniel Tsentsiper (24:23.211) Bias, not biased, but they're very strong headed over. What is it like for you to come in and then work with that founder, either to make them an executive to become a leader or to have that, maybe that tough conversation like, Hey, maybe someone else needs to come in and take the, take the helm for the betterment of the brand. Sherif Mityas (24:26.685) Yes. Sherif Mityas (24:43.548) Yeah. Well, our, I don't know if it's a cop out, but our model is, we, we require kind of a full ownership, when we acquire a brand and, we actually, in some cases we'll have like a 30, 60 day kind of consulting agreement, right. To help us through the transition. but we, we are part of our deal is we exit the founders. and, for. Daniel Tsentsiper (25:03.678) Hmm. Makes sense, yeah. Daniel Tsentsiper (25:10.474) See you Sherif Mityas (25:12.136) Part of that reason is to what you just brought up. We feel like we need to be able to make the decisions, make a clean break, and really take the brand onward with respect to what's been built, right? And understanding those learnings. But it's never, at least in my experience, a productive relationship when you're still trying to get rooted into the past versus moving forward. Daniel Tsentsiper (25:39.114) Right. I see. I see. That's interesting. And I do like that point of view. I can see both sides, right? In some ways, the founder could be critical to the brand, but it's also, you have a tried and tested model that works. And as part of your engine of growth, certain things need to be done. And that's just one part of it. I'm curious if, you know, looking into the next, let's just call it two to three years. If I had to have a conversation with you in two to three years and I asked you, what did you accomplish? Right. What were the, what would be some of those agenda items and what would you want to get done to be proud of in those, in that, in that timeframe? Sherif Mityas (26:24.574) Yeah, I think it's, uh, it sums down to one word, which is growth. Um, you know, for us, um, you know, in a couple of years, we will have hopefully added at least two more brands, uh, into the portfolio. We will have added at least, um, another call it, you know, 40 to 50 units, uh, of organic growth of the brands that we do have separate from the acquisitions. Um, growth of our franchisees, growth in our profitability, growth in the portfolio. To us, if you're not growing, you're dying, right? And so, every year we have growth targets, two years from now, no different. We'd wanna be much larger. Daniel Tsentsiper (27:07.136) Here's what around you mentioned at the beginning, you guys only you guys only invest in brands that have a franchising component of it that are franchising, right? That are not independent. Have you ever considered investing in a brand that hasn't yet started franchising and then helping them through that process? Sherif Mityas (27:27.23) We have, we've taken a look at some small brands like in that kind of call it the 15 to 20 unit range of folks, founder led again, that I've been thinking about franchising. Those are a little tougher nuts to be honest with you because there's so much effort that then has to be built in terms of, you know, all the operating manuals and the books and the franchise agreements and all those pieces. So we haven't, we haven't been on one of those yet. Never say never, but we're again, Daniel Tsentsiper (27:43.891) in Daniel Tsentsiper (27:52.991) in Sherif Mityas (27:56.734) To me, it goes down to those three things I mentioned earlier. If we found something with a great team, great food, and a unique hook, we'd consider it. Daniel Tsentsiper (28:06.055) Yeah. And how do you, for the first point for the customers loving it, loving the product, how do you go through and do that? Did you do diligence? you look at reviews? Do you, I've heard some, some people go in and, become like a secret shopper and look around and ask the guests and the teammates of what they think of the brand. do you, what is your strategy around them? Sherif Mityas (28:26.558) All the above. Yes. We mystery shop the heck out of it. I know when we, before we bought clean juice, I visited at least 20 locations myself around the country, but then we do, we go on social, right? We see what people are saying. We, we see what the buzz is on their social media channels. We see what the buzz is on Google and Yelp and all the other, you know, platforms. it says a lot, right? What those experiences were, what people are talking about the hype. Daniel Tsentsiper (28:28.222) I'll do both. Sherif Mityas (28:53.246) and so it helps us understand it. And then we'll even do like, many focus groups, right? Well, we have some consumers in different demographics around the country and we'll say, have you heard of this brand? Tell me your thoughts. Right. Just get some unvarnished feedback. and you know, we do that as much as we can with consumers. mean, we'll test new items. We'll look at new brands. We'll look at new concepts. Daniel Tsentsiper (29:05.989) And. Sherif Mityas (29:20.574) To me, if the consumer's not saying it works, then it really doesn't matter what anyone in this building thinks. It's all about the guests. They pay our bills at the end of the day. Daniel Tsentsiper (29:26.922) Make circle. Daniel Tsentsiper (29:30.683) Absolutely. And you can see in the restaurant industry, you can see when a customer is truly delighted with a product, you can see it in their eyes, right? And people will talk nonstop about the brands they enjoy. And it's, when you have something like that, regardless of how big you are, I think it's really special. And that's something that I'm trying to elevate on this show is that regardless of how much money you're making, regardless of how many stores you have, regardless of how much experience you have, if you have Sherif Mityas (29:38.718) to proceed. Daniel Tsentsiper (29:59.536) a brand that people love and you want to grow it. There's so many avenues to do that. And I think for you and your team, you've done a great job of finding those brands and giving them breathing life into them and bringing in your expertise. And I wish you guys all the best. Sherif, I have one last question for you. I always ask my guests who in this industry inspires you, who in this industry has given you, you know, something to look up to, who do you look up to in this industry? And we'd love for myself to learn who they are and for my audience still, so check them Sherif Mityas (30:32.796) Well, that's an easy one. It's actually the chairman of my board. It's John Antiaco. So I had the opportunity to meet John many, many years ago. He was the CEO at Blockbuster and I was the CEO at Movie Gallery. So we were both in the same industry together, not in food. And then he went on to be very big in food and he's been an eight time CEO at Taco Bell and Daniel Tsentsiper (30:38.908) John and Tiaco. Sherif Mityas (31:00.894) P.F. Chang's and Friday's and Circle K and, you know, learn a lot from him every day that I have the opportunity to interact with him. Always been a role model of mine and a mentor and I'm thankful that he's on my board and helping lead this team. Daniel Tsentsiper (31:16.955) What's something unique about his leadership style or his personality that you think makes him successful? Sherif Mityas (31:22.714) he's, he's, think the thing I'm most appreciative of him is he's honest to a, honest to a fault. he won't sugar coat. And I love that because, this industry is about doing it right. doing right by the guests and it's about speed and it's about honesty at all levels, all the way down to the hourly team members. And, I've always got that from him and I appreciate that. Daniel Tsentsiper (31:49.277) Amazing. Sharif, thank you so much for joining the show. Thank you for sharing with us your wisdom. And I'm excited to see where you guys go in the next two to three years. Wish you all the best. Sherif Mityas (31:59.09) Thank you, thanks for having me on. Daniel Tsentsiper (32:00.839) Have a good one.