During his first week as CEO of Blaze Pizza, John Owen donned a black Blaze Pizza polo T-shirt, black jeans, shoes and a hat and took to the makeline at a designated training restaurant in Orlando, Florida.
While the staff know he’s CEO, he’s treated just as another employee learning the ropes at the fast casual pizza chain, he said.. He’s spending his whole first week in training, learning different roles and understanding the barriers that might be impeding execution.
“You’ve got to be able to stand in the shoes of the franchisees and know what they go through day in and day out,” Owen said. “When you’re talking to the franchisees … about an issue that they might be having, I actually, hopefully will understand it after I’m fully trained.”
While he’s training, he’s also asking employees about what Blaze can do to make their lives easier, and about gaps on the menu and problems with specific menu items.
Owen has plenty of experience — nearly 30 years — running restaurants. He most recently served as chief operating officer at Scooter’s Coffee, but spent nearly two decades at McDonald’s, rising from crew member to corporate vice president of strategy and execution. He also was president and CEO of Subway Russia, the brand’s master franchisor in that country. He helped run restaurants as a franchisee, as well.
“I've had the opportunity to … view the [restaurant industry] from every point of view, to make sure that, as we work together between those three groups [of] franchisees, suppliers and our support team, we ensure that everybody wins,” he said.
Restaurant Dive spoke with Owen during his first week as CEO about what it takes to run a good restaurant, what he looks forward to at Blaze and how the company is positioning itself to overcome existing challenges in the fast casual pizza segment.
Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
RESTAURANT DIVE: What made you want to dive into in-store training and working at a restaurant?
JOHN OWEN: It's important to know how the restaurants run on a day-in and day-out basis, and we're here to serve great products to our guests. You can't understand how to make an impact on that without understanding where we are today and how it looks. Just for me personally, I've always been much more of an in-store, spend time with franchisees, spend time with the folks that are running the restaurants [guy] than a desk guy. Not that those things aren't important as the CEO, but you’ve got to understand the [restaurant] level of the business.
In my previous life as a consultant, I spent a lot of time on earnings calls, and you can quickly tell which leaders of companies actually know the details of their business and which ones run the company from behind a desk. And that's just not who I am.
What brought you to Blaze?
The opportunity to work with great people, franchisees, and the fact that the product is just so good. When the board first contacted me about the opportunity, I gained an understanding that Brentwood, which is the majority owner, has a literal vested interest, not just the financial interest, but is truly interested in running great restaurants. That piece is important.
My support team is made up of really good, smart, intelligent people, and then there’s just the fun of getting involved with something where I can make a difference with my experience.
What is involved in running a great restaurant?
I’m a very basic kind of person, so great products and hospitality at higher levels. I think some of the things that have plagued the pizza sector have been that, especially as a result of the pandemic, [brands in the sector] have been kind of transactional in nature. You get online, you order, it gets delivered, but you don't really have a relationship with the restaurant and the people that work there.
The restaurant I happen to be in now in Orlando, just the number of people I've seen come in while I've been training who actually know everybody here. For the takeout business or delivery business, there are designated stalls, which a lot of restaurants have for their curbside service, but this particular store goes so far as to designate somebody to bring product out to that customer, rather than having them come in and search through what sometimes can seem like a rack of product, where you don't understand which pizza is yours.
So hospitality is really important. We're going to lean in heavily on that and make sure that the differentiation in the experience compared to competitors is the fact that we make a connection with you. It's just not a transaction of ordering the pizza online or ordering the pizza in the store. It’s an experience.
What problems are plaguing the pizza sector and how do you see Blaze Pizza overcoming those challenges?
You’ve got to have franchisees who are passionate about the business and involved. And that's one of the things that impresses me about Blaze. When I had my introductory call with the franchisees, they're excited about the future. They especially appreciate the operational background that I bring to the business and the long experience that I have in franchising, in general. Those folks have to be involved. It can't just be an investor-type of setup.
The other is just understanding that pizza, regardless of the impact that the sector has seen over the last couple of years post pandemic, is still a very large segment, and a large portion of consumers enjoy having pizza on a regular basis. The opportunity still exists. It's a matter of getting people to understand that Blaze is not like everybody else, that we do intend to connect with our customers more than just the transaction piece of it, that the product itself is great.
The other piece is the customization side of Blaze. Personalization of the experience, especially as it relates to Gen Z, has become more and more potent over the last couple of years. You can come into Blaze and make your own pizza however you want, and be charged the same price as if you bought one of the Signature Pizzas — that also differentiates us.
So there's a lot of opportunity. It'll be focused on the basics, first around menu innovation, elevating the brand and the experience itself, and then underneath all of that, how do we ensure that our franchisees are profitable, so that they get a return on their investment, because they are businessmen at heart who happen to just love to run restaurants.
Blaze updated its menu in 2024. How do you feel about where things are right now with the products?
I love that there's so much variety. I love how everything's fresh. Yeah, it was, frankly, surprising to me that there were so many options available. I think those are all good. Right now, we've got Protien-zza, focusing on folks that want a GLP-1 [friendly] experience, and even after that ends, they'll have the opportunity to continue to have that kind of experience because it's made with existing ingredients.
The Blaze menu has always been about lifestyle choices. I'm pretty happy with where we are on the Signature Pizzas. I'm literally working my way through the menu, making sure I get a chance to taste each one myself.
What is Blaze Pizza’s near-term and long-term growth potential?
It’s definitely too soon to answer that, but I would tell you that there’s a focus on the basics. The important thing immediately is to understand franchisee financial health and know that they’re in a good position to be able to grow.
And then, obviously, look at where our opportunities are and where we have white space in the geography as well as international [markets]. I’ve got plenty of international experience, so I’m excited about what the future might bring there.
But for right now, I'm going to be focused on spending time with franchisees and understanding where they stand, what their issues are, and getting them excited about continuing to invest in Blaze, as well as ensuring that we've got a healthy pipeline of new franchisees.
