Success Story

Rapid Growth Achieved with Solid Systems and by Educating Leadership on Managing Key Metrics

Juan Martinez believes that consistency around prime cost - and educating his leadership staff about it - have been extremely beneficial for his company.

"My goal has been for my staff to understand that the restaurant is a business, at the end of the day. Having them understand the metrics on areas they can control has been a great part of our culture," he notes. "We all benefit from it. If we are profitable, it means more bonuses and opportunities for everyone in the company."

There was a problem, Martinez recounts: food cost kept fluctuating, some weeks quite drastically. "I knew I had to dig deeper and find out the why behind the what. Some of the staff were not well educated on the financial aspect of the business, so I figured it would be in our best interest, as a growing organization, to start teaching key members the importance of knowing the numbers and what causes the metrics to move up or down."

Martinez had become aware of the situation by looking at trends in his company's financial reporting as it grew from one location to four. He says he became aware of the solution when he clicked on RestaurantOwner.com.

"RestaurantOwner.com has been a great resource for me, from HR to operations," he insists. "I always find good value. Looking at the forums and seeing real people going through the same struggles as me, and finding RestaurantOwner.com staff members sharing their experiences on the issues and offering great feedback that potentially can fix the issue, is very, very valuable. It's a great resource to have if you are in the food-and-hospitality industry."

In fact, it has helped Martinez implement what he terms "solid" systems within his organization "that allowed me to expand from one location to now four, opening our fifth this coming June."

Having a firmer grip on the numbers, Martinez suggests, has allowed him to think like a business owner, working on my business - implementing systems and spending a lot of my time looking for ways for the company to get better - instead of working in the business, doing all the cooking myself. With multiple locations, I cannot cook at every single one of them at the same time."

During the course of 2017, Martinez believes he learned to handle more capacity when it came to managing multiple locations, while keeping the same level of service, quality of food, and profitability. "Managing consistency across all areas of running my restaurant business has been a major focus for the past three years. RestaurantOwner.com has been a great partner, giving me the tools I need to succeed. Why? Because systems work."

The mood at Don Juan Mex Grill for the remainder of 2018 is sure to continue to be upbeat. Says Martinez, "We are excited, as we are going to be opening our fifth location. This one, instead of being fast-casual, will be an affordable casual-dining Mexican concept. We got an opportunity to purchase a building with plenty of parking in a very hot area of our current market."

On a somewhat personal level, Martinez was recently accepted into the Stanford Latino Entrepreneurship Initiative Education Scaling Program at Stanford Graduate School of Business in California. "I plan to get more knowledge on how to continue to scale my company with a rock-solid foundation. I am very excited about this opportunity."

Martinez also sees the dining-out public itself continuing to evolve. Technology and convenience "are a big part of the up-and-coming generation. As restaurant owners, we must learn to adapt and stay flexible with the ever-changing needs of the customers."