Why Every Restaurant Needs a Pivot | John Spreitzer
Episode notes
John Spreitzer runs Green Lantern Pizza. He has seventeen stores across Metro Detroit, two more opening, and a franchise company being built behind the operation.
He opened his Berkeley location in February 2020. But three weeks later, Covid shut it down. Everything he had was tied up in his store. He didn't even know if he'd lose his house…
They made it through and learned from the experience. Now he's building a franchise model, aiming to hit a hundred stores over the next ten years.
In this episode of Beyond The Hustle, we covered:
→ Growing from one location to seventeen stores
→ Why minimum wage is the biggest threat to the business
→ The real story behind the Pepperoni King brand
→ Marketing in the age of AI and managing reviews across every location
→ Why he helps competitors down the street instead of ignoring them
Thanks John for making the time to sit down and and share with our listeners!
Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:04 Meet John Spreitzer and the story of Green Lantern Pizza
3:00 Franchising 17 stores and building the company behind them
5:51 Off the grid bear hunting in Quebec
9:48 The vision to scale to 100 stores
12:13 Minimum wage, food costs, and the economics of running pizza shops
18:29 Road construction, real competitors, and supporting the neighborhood
20:44 Cup and char pepperoni and building the Pepperoni King brand
30:43 Marketing in the age of AI and managing reviews across 17 locations
35:25 Almost losing everything during Covid, and his advice for anyone starting a restaurant
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