EVERYTABLE RESETS ITS TABLE CONTINUED...
EMERGING BRANDS
profitable channels.” The seven units in New York have closed. The partnership with NYC Health ended. And other revenue streams are now challenged: In Los Angeles, funding for the city’s Se- nior Meal Program is scheduled to end on Aug. 31. It’s unclear whether it will be continued. In the early years, Everytable had benefitted big time from the rise in impact investing, said Polk. The free-flowing venture capital money that had begun to bleed over from the technology sector into tra- ditional, “boring businesses,” like food, had fueled the early aggres- sive visions of growth. “And when capital markets turned, we realized that, in order to ensure the survival of the business, we needed to basically cut down on anything that wasn’t already prof- itable,” he said, “and really build a fortress of cash flow in Southern California.” It was, he added, “a capital mar- ket shift away from growth at all costs as a priority to profitability be- ing a priority.” FORGING DIAMONDS There were other challenges. Last year Everytable also lost two key ex- ecutives, both passionate advocates for the brand. Christine Hasircoglu, the former senior vice president of store operations, is now with Planta Restaurants, but declined to com- ment for this article. Bryce Fluellen, who was executive director of the Social Equity Franchise program, also departed Everytable, and then tragically died on Jan. 1. He was 53. The reset has been a bit of a “knee grinder,” Polk said. But Everytable needed to learn what he said most restaurant oper- ators probably already know: “that food businesses are deeply opera- tional and very hard to scale. It’s a game of inches.”
PHOTO COURTESY OF EVERYTABLE
A BRAND BUILT ON EFFICIENCY
“The Amazon of Quinoa Bowls.” It’s a model others are also ex- ploring, including startups like Wonder, the drive-thru concept Salad & Go and the new Kernel con- cept created by Chipotle founder Steve Ells. But to work, Everytable had to grow—and grow fast—to take ad- vantage of economies of scale. By this year, the company had expected to be open in New York, Northern California, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Boston, Phoenix and possibly Chicago and Texas. Another door was opening with foodservice contracts. The com- pany in November had announced a partnership with NYC Health + Hospitals that would have brought outlets to just about every public hospital in the city’s five boroughs, for example. In Los Angeles, city officials contracted with Everytable to pro- vide meal services to both seniors and the homeless in programs that brought thousands of nutritious meals to people in need. But last year, it became clear the company would have to make some difficult decisions. To complete a fundraising round, Polk said Every- table would have to close all “un-
Polk was inspired to create Every- table after watching the documen- tary “A Place at the Table,” about food insecurity in America. He first launched a nonprofit called Groc- eryships, that was designed to help low-income families buy nutri- tious, wholesome food. But his vi- sion turned to the for-profit sector, where he hoped to demonstrate a better solution. The basic concept is simple: Ev- erytable is a chain of 900-square- foot storefronts served by a central commissary kitchen, where from- scratch meals like salmon and qui- noa over arugula or Chili Crisp Noodles with Sesame Chicken are prepared and delivered daily to the retail outlets for grab and go. The units have no kitchens and can be run with two or three workers. Pricing is determined on a slid- ing scale. An Everytable dish might be $6 in a lower-income neighbor- hood, for example, and $8 in a high- er-income area, to help subsidize food costs. It’s a centralized production model built around hyper efficien- cy. In fact, The New York Times in a 2021 headline dubbed Everytable
54
RESTAURANT BUSINESS OCTOBER 2024
Powered by FlippingBook