Dirty soda restaurant brand Swig names Rian McCartan CEO

Former Berkshire Hathaway executive will lead the growing brand with majority investment from Savory Fund Former Berkshire Hathaway executive will lead the growing brand with majority investment from Savory Fund. Swig, named Rian McCartan as its new CEO on Thursday. McCartan is the former vice president of global retail and real estate for See’s Candy, a Berkshire Hathaway company. McCartan has also held leadership positions with American Eagle Outfitters, Williams-Sonoma Inc., and Skechers U.S.A. In June 2020, Swig received a majority investment from Savory Fund, a private equity group based in Salt Lake City with investments in nine emerging restaurant concepts. -----------

Subway plans to double its Asia Pacific

store count within five years

Subway entered Indonesia last year in partnership with Map Boga Adiperkasa and has recently opened Southeast Asia’s first Subway drive-thru location in the country. The brand earlier this year said it intended to open 70 to 80 new restaurants a year in Thailand and 500 stores across Peninsular Malaysia during the next 10 years under a multi-year franchise agreement with its local franchisees.

Subway has signed nine master franchise and country developer agreements in the past 15 months across Asia-Pacific, EMEA and Latin America and the Caribbean region, which is estimated to account for more than 5300 new restaurants over the next decade.

The pizza chain will have a fleet of 800 electric vehicles, which it says will be the largest EV pizza delivery fleet in the U.S. Domino's electric vehicle

Domino’s Pizza is going electric.

The Ann Arbor, Mich.-based pizza chain on Monday said that it would roll out what it says is the nation’s largest fleet of electric pizza delivery vehicles. The company will send 800 Chevy Bolt EVs to select franchise and corporate stores around the country.

The fleet will be located in each state. The company is working with Enterprise Fleet Management, which will work on account management, vehicle acquisition and financing, telematics and maintenance.

The EV fleet makes practical sense, too. Electric cars do not need regular oil changes, for instance, and they do not need to be filled with gas. The EVs have lower average maintenance costs than nonelectric cars. Domino’s said that the Chevy Bolts have enough battery life for “days of deliveries,” with a 259-mile range.

Domino’s already delivers with electric bikes or scooters in 24 international markets, including the U.S.

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Shake Shack Founder Backs Chip City as

It Prepares Franchise Rollout

Danny Meyer's Enlightened Hospitality Investments raised its second fund this year, for $330 million, and has invested $10 million in Chip City, the New York City-based cookie concept with 14 units that is poised to franchise.

"I don't get credit for discovering Chip City," Meyer said in an interview yesterday in West Village in New York, where he arrived mid-morning after a workout at the gym and then a meeting at Shake Shack, the $2.19 billion burger chain he founded and in 2015 took public.

Meyer is well-known in the restaurant business for creating Union Square Café, Gramercy Tavern, Shake Shack and some 16 other concepts over a 40-year career that began when he was 27. In 2015, he introduced a "hospitality Included" policy, which eliminated tipping from all Union Square Hospitality Group restaurants but ran into problems—"We couldn't make the math work,"

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Which Wich Puts Innovative Spin on Kiosk Ordering
The roughly 250-unit sandwich chain has a unique answer to the labor crisis.
Which Wich CEO Jeff Sinelli said the YellowLab technology was born from an underwhelming restaurant experience during the pandemic.Eventually, he arrived at a piece of innovation that combines the use of human capital and man-made technology. It's referred to as YellowLab—an in-store ordering kiosk run by remote workers, or virtual cashiers. When a guest approaches the kiosk, the employee receives a notification and proceeds to greet the customer and assist with any questions. When the order process is completed, food is prepared for pickup in the back of house. One of the biggest benefits, Sinelli explains, is that these employees are able to run YellowLab kiosks from multiple locations at once.

But this isn't the only forward-thinking novelty on the horizon for the roughly 250-unit Which Wich. QSR reached out to Sinelli to learn more about where the brand is heading and how it's combatting the latest COVID challenges.

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Cannabis Franchise Holistic Connection Takes ‘Farm-to-Table’ Approach

Holistic Connection Founder Mike Soloman compares his cannabis retail shop and bar experience to that of a wine tasting, where the servers are knowledgeable and can help an experienced or novice guest find something they’d enjoy.

The brand’s biggest sellers are edibles and infused drinks—think of a margarita with THC instead of tequila.

Holistic Connection has its first restaurant and cannabis bar combo open in Nashville, called Buds & Brews. Sauces and a few desserts are infused with THC. Soloman said it’s the first cannabis restaurant in the state. It opened a few months ago, “and it’s getting a lot of praise,” Soloman said. He’s also franchising the concept.

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NEWS

What all of this month's technology news

means for the restaurant industry at large

Le Pain Quotidien and Little Beet unite under new platform

Taco Bell experiments with more Nacho Fries variations

Fuku taps Claudia Lezcano as its new CEO

Menu Tracker: New items from Burger King, Chick-fil-A, Popeyes, and Wendy’s

Domino's rolling out fleet of electric delivery vehicles

Saladworks, Frutta Bowls opening co-branded restaurant

Krystal opens 1st location in Puerto Rico

Buona, Original Rainbow Cone opening dual-concept locations in Tennessee

Le Pain Quotidien under new ownership