Jeff's Journey from Law School to Acai Empire

Jeremy Julian - Restaurant ...: excited to bring our episode to you today with the founder of Ever Bowl. He and I have been running in the same circles, but this is the first chance he and I've gotten a chance to meet. created a really cool brand that ⁓ is bringing Acai bowls to the masses.

⁓ also doing quite a bit in the way ⁓ ⁓ the build out of the restaurants to make it simpler and less expensive to continue to build out and grow. ⁓ Jeremy Julian - RTG: Welcome back to the Restaurant Technology Guys podcast. I thank everyone out there for joining us. ⁓ As I like to each and every time, I you guys have got lots of choices, so thanks for hanging out this week.

⁓ Today, these are fun stories because got a multiple-time entrepreneur that's on the show. ⁓ Lots of pokers on the fire, I'm going to let Jeff talk a little bit about ⁓ where his background came from a bit, and then we'll talk a little bit about his restaurant venture that we want to share with our listeners. So, Jeff. Why don't you introduce yourself to ⁓ the listeners out there.

Jeremy Julian - Restaurant ...: ⁓ really interesting ideas that he's got, including managing some of the supply chain from start to finish if you want it. Really innovative concept. I would encourage you to check out my conversation with Jeff.

If you don't know me, my name is Jeremy Julian. I'm the Chief Revenue Officer for CBS Northstar. We wrote the Northstar PontoSale solution for multi-units. Please check us out at cbsnorthstar.

com. And now onto the episode. Jeff: Well, thanks, Jeremy. to be here.

Obviously, we talked offline, you know, we met in a little while ago anyway, ⁓ but appreciate what you're doing for the community and I always enjoy coming on. So, yeah, I'm Jeff Finster, girl dad importantly. ⁓ I got 20-year-old and a 14-year-old that are the apple of my eye in why I do what I do. But ⁓ ultimately, you I call myself now a serial entrepreneur because it sounds better than a degenerate entrepreneur.

⁓ Thank you. Jeremy Julian - RTG: unemployable. Is that what that means? ⁓ Jeff: Yes, I'm a bad employee.

You will never want to hire me. And if you do, you're going to hate me. So don't follow directions very well. And I don't see boxes.

It's not that I try to paint outside a box. I just don't see the box. I don't understand boxes. And I to law school sports agent for a little bit and found out really quickly that back before the internet and zoom, that was the job I didn't want to do.

And so I kind of got thrust into business. ⁓ Sales very successful in a small little company called ADP, which is a massive payroll company. And Six months there, was the number one sales rep in the country, made a lot of money, was able to use my relationship game of how I do relationship-based selling and solution-based selling and was successful. so got into a fight with them over $15,000 in my pay.

out of law school, I made $38,000 a year base pay, which by the way, in California is less than a 15-year-old makes a minimum wage, but neither here nor there. Got disagreement, and at 25, I basically told them to go f themselves. Jeremy Julian - RTG: ⁓ well. Jeff: quit and started my first company called iChecks because the whole thing was I didn't like the company I worked for and I'd never heard the word entrepreneur.

I didn't know what that was. know, growing up it was business owner or employee and business owners tended to have family businesses and things like it was just never something I ever considered doing. And so of spite, I started my first company at 25 and you know, 18 later, I guess here we are. Jeremy Julian - RTG: and how many different businesses just go through them before we jump into Ever Bowl because I, you know, you and I talked pre-recording and for those that are long-time listeners, they know typically I'll talk for five or 10 minutes with the guest before I record.

Jeff: Yeah, of course. you know, ultimately there's been a lot of companies. My first company that I officially started was iChecks, which was a payroll company that turned into Canopy HR, which was a payroll and HR company. And we built an HRIS platform, if you will, like an app.

This was back in 2007. So when the iPhone came out a few years later and apps became the thing, we built an app and we digitized that old filing cabinet folder of Manila folders that had people's applications and everything inside. ⁓ I started a recruiting agency as well at the same time of the great recession because people were unemployed and it was hard to find talent. So I felt like I could help my current customer base at my payroll company with increasing their employee count by having a recruiting agency.

And I made money, the more employees they had. So was self-serving or vertically integrated, not knowing what I was doing. And so I was able to sell both of those two companies and those were my first two successful exits. Then I thought I walked on water and I started about four, four companies that were complete failures.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: Love it. Jeff: I call them learnings. call them investments into ⁓ getting my MBA. And then I started ⁓ digital marketing agency with Neil Patel.

He's a famous digital marketer. We worked with a lot of really cool clients, ⁓ sold that in 2015. Along that path, I invested and started a handful of small companies. Some were mediocre, nothing crazy or extremely successful.

Some died, ⁓ some great. And great being they didn't die. That was definition. Jeremy Julian - RTG: How well.

Jeff: I our digital marketing agency clients in 2015 and I tried to retire. I was 32 at the time and my wife kicked me out of the house because I was driving her and the kids crazy and said, you better go do something because you can't sit here all day. I have things to do and you're too high strong. And was visiting a previous digital marketing client in Poway, California and I went to a smoothie king to get a smoothie and the owner of the smoothie king was actually taking equipment out of the store and into his van.

And I said, are you closed? And he said, no, but we're closed on Friday. This was a Wednesday. And this was in, this was in August of 2016.

And I said, do you mind telling me why you're closing? And he said, I'm retiring. I tried to sell the business. And I had always thought about opening up an acai bowl store because I loved acai bowls and I was importing them into my house from Chicago, getting acai from Chicago.

And there was no Diego really. And I'm a bit of a hypochondriac. I'm afraid of disease. So I like to eat healthy and prevent illness and do these things on my own.

And Jeremy Julian - RTG: Wow. Jeff: I was also considering opening an office for consulting and you know, the things I was already doing, business consulting. So was like, ⁓ you know, can get an office. I don't have to sit at home.

And I was like, you know what, what if I open a restaurant and I put my office in the back so I don't have to pay rent? I could just literally write everything off and have my acai bowl kitchen in the front, serve some customers and not really care about the restaurant, but then do my business in the back. And this kind of thing happened. So I said, do you mind giving me the landlord's name and number?

He did. And I called the landlord and four days later I signed a lease for, ⁓ the location in Poway without a name or a menu or any idea what the hell I was gonna do. But my logic was if the smoothie king lasted 20 years, worst case I just sell smoothies. I I know how to make those and I'm gonna have an office anyway.

okay, for know, 4500 bucks a month, I can have an office and have this thing and let's do it. And so I just kind of signed it on a whim. And that was the birth of Everbowl, which was not called Everbowl for a while. And ⁓ after built my first Everbowl, I...

Jeremy Julian - RTG: That's incredible. Jeff: cost me way too much to build it. So I started a construction fabrication company called WeBuild and built every Ever Bowl since and now build for brands all across the country. And because I import superfoods and they're very expensive, I realized that I had to control that.

So I went down to Brazil in 2017 and started buying direct from the factories and my, my pitaya from Vietnam and Nicaragua. And I have an import company and now I manufacture and have all of our own base flavors and granolas and stuff for Ever Bowl. Not granola anymore, but we used to, and that's called Unevolved Products. I have a show the Jeff Ensor Show, which is on hiatus right now because I ⁓ to do it at the level I want to.

So after the first season, we were paused, but we'll bring it back once my life slows down and I'm a girl that which is a business of ⁓ own. ⁓ Jeremy Julian - RTG: I love it. Yeah, I've got two girls of my own and two boys. So life is busy in my house.

weekend I've got ⁓ sons graduating from college and then in two weeks my daughter's graduating from high school. ⁓ So yeah, life is full. ⁓ is very full. ⁓ for those that are not familiar and again, being a girl dad.

Jeff: I want to give you a hug. Congratulations Jeremy. Congratulations. Jeremy Julian - RTG: I got a daughter, my 18 year old daughter loves them loves herself some acai bowls.

So I guess educate our listeners that might be in a place that they haven't been able to experience acai as you know, as a product category. We actually had Ryan, I don't know if you know Ryan Black from Samazan. He was on the show maybe a year ago. So he was on a year ago, he did a little bit of education.

But for those that are not familiar with what an acai bowl is, or kind of what what is that concept? Because it's it's a little smoothie, but it's not you know, I know what it is my daughter I Jeff: He's been a friend for years. Jeremy Julian - RTG: It's on my freaking credit card more often than I care to admit at the one up the street. But yeah, why don't you educate our listeners a little bit what is an Ever Bowl and kind of what makes the product unique.

Jeff: Sure, well, Acai and Ever are a little different, although I like the fact that we're calling an Acai Bowl and Ever Bowl. menu's actually expanding, so we're going away from just being so heavy on just superfood bowls. But think of it like a smoothie bowl. If you about the transition, we had ice cream, then we had frozen yogurt, which was better for you, and then we have juicing, and then we have smoothies, and now we have smoothie bowls.

And so if you take a smoothie and you turn it into a yogurt, that's basically what these bowls are. toppings and the toppings hopefully are gonna be a little bit better for you than just ⁓ &Ms and junk, but you could put that on there if you have to. So acai specifically is just a very, very nutrient dense powerhouse of antioxidants that comes from a very unique remote place in the world of the rainforest in mostly in Brazil. There's a little bit in Peru and a little bit in Columbia, but predominantly you're getting 98 % of the world's acai coming from this region, mostly in the Paro region up in the Northeast of Brazil.

And what makes it very unique is its high level of antioxidants. And it's so good for you. of how, you everyone says how good blueberries are. It's even better for you than a blueberry and it looks like a blueberry, except it grows on a tree and not on the ground.

And there's a big seed in the middle. So there's very little pulp and juice. So each berry that is the same size as a blueberry has way less consumable value. Yeah, there's less pulp, less root.

it doesn't survive unless you freeze it. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Edible product, yeah. Edible product, yeah. Jeff: which is why it's served frozen cold.

So if you go to Brazil, you can have it fresh, you can have it warm, can even use it on fish as like ⁓ a puree on top, like you could have like a jam here. But you can't pick it and then not have it frozen, it will die within 48 hours. So the ability for us to not have it as a frozen variety here as a smoothie or as a bowl, or a powder is impossible. ⁓ And also what makes it unique because it is so dense and so...

If you actually know who the first brand to ever bring in the United States was MonaVie. If you guys remember that MLM moment 25 years ago, MonaVie, they used to bring in Acai and that was one of the first companies to bring in Acai ever. Another friend of mine in the industry, ⁓ his uncle, I think started MonaVie and he was down there on a... something for religion, he was down there and he's the one who found Aasai and brought it in from Mono Vie.

And so he's one of the first people to ever bring it in. And then Ryan Black came and brought it in. So Ryan is great. Ryan is a friend of mine forever.

⁓ We don't do business together, even though we really compete. Both jokingly say we want to buy the other company and ⁓ we dance. His company huge as far as importing of product and we're more of retail. But that's what is.

so Ever Bowl is more than Aasai. Jeremy Julian - RTG: That's awesome. Jeff: We're also in a bunch of other superfood bowls and we're not a healthy restaurant. We're a better for you restaurant.

And I think there's a big distinction there. We're trying to meet everybody where they are. You the impetus behind why I eat acai bowls was because they mask quality food that tastes good. I don't like veggies when I was a kid.

I didn't like fruits. I like junk food. And there's a reason why all candy, by the way, is. color-coded and looks like fruit colors because we're attracted to it as a species.

Glucose is required, right? So the sugar, the sweetness. And so when my oldest, who's 20, was she was three, we were trying to get her to eat zucchini, a couple of bites of zucchini or four. And my wife was like, get to eat your zucchini.

And then she could have Cool Whip, which was her dessert, like a couple of scoops of Cool Whip. And she was like arguing with my wife, like, I'm not going to eat that, you know, whatever. And finally my wife got annoyed and I was like, all right, I'll do it. So I put the Cool Whip on the zucchini and fed it to her and she ate it.

And I realized you can hide nutrition with taste. So Everpul was designed to help people eat better by meeting them where they are in their nutritional and health journey. So if you eat only junk food, I'm going to give you junk-ish, but it's a little bit better and I'm going to coax you that way. And that's the whole spirit of Everpul.

And so Everpul's meant to solve four main problems. And I believe all businesses and restaurants need to have ⁓ a target of what we're doing. Are we improving something? Are we creating something?

Are we solving something? And I'm trying to solve why the average American eats fast food more than 3.2 times a week. And we're killing ourselves with how we eat.

And so I can change your eating behavior if I can make it affordable, filling, delicious and accessible. Because that's basically what fast food is. It's affordable or it used to be before we went crazy in pricing, but it used to be affordable. It's filling the Big Mac, you know, supersize it.

It's filling because it's a lot of food. It's everywhere and it's tasty. mean, it's fake. food that they made tasty, right?

It doesn't go bad. So it created the ability for it to taste really good. So we're fighting a good fight here because we also don't get the fun subsidies that the government gives for fruit. They give it for burgers and cheese and farming and here in America.

So we have a more expensive product we've got to do. And that's the whole goal here of Everbow is how do we make this a fun brand, help people choose better. And the good news is like Wayne Gretzky said, skate to where the puck's going to be your daughter, my daughter, that generation. They don't like McDonald's.

They actually know the value. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yep, 100%. Yeah. Jeff: I grew up like my family would sit at the dinner table in the 80s and we would have McDonald's as dinner.

The thought of that today is like insane and sorry McDonald's but I'm coming after you know, or take you know, they got to do better and we've got to do better. So that's really what Ever Bowl is and Ryan Black's part of that goal and so are we and ⁓ he's great and Sam O'Zahn's great and yeah. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Absolutely. Awesome.

Well, talk us through the concept itself. I think I went to one, you guys used to have one in RSM, right? Santa Margarita. So that was the very first time I ever walked into an Everball.

My best friend lives walking distance from that store. We were walking around that shopping mall. like, I'm gonna go check this place out. And I went and got a bowl.

It was probably eight, nine years ago in that same shopping center. There's a Home Depot on the other side of that shopping center. I know. Jeff: Yes.

Yes. That's correct, yes. And was a Menchies, ⁓ Jeremy Julian - RTG: Okay. So know exactly where that is.

I've been to the concept. That's the only store I have been to. I'll be fully transparent. That's the only store that I've walked, you know, set foot in.

Now that I moved to Dallas, it's a little bit, a little bit harder to find. I'm sure there's some on the other side of town. Okay. We'll have to figure out how make my way there, but talk people through the concept, you know, counter service, relatively quick, but, super, you know, healthy.

I guess. Jeff: Hear me? I got nine in Dallas. No, we got nine in Dallas.

So no excuses, Jeremy. We're going to have a talk after this. There's no excuses. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Walk through what is the concept like?

How much of it's on-prem? How much of it's off-prem? Talk through the unit and how you guys are doing sales-wise and whatnot. Jeff: Okay.

Yeah. So conceptually, think about it like this. For the older crowd, think Baskin Robbins, but better for you. So we've been able to, we used to blend everything to order, we've obviously with throughput, with speed, with 3PD, with the movement of humans and how fast we need things, the Instagram world that we're in, we need 10 seconds or less.

We've created a way to take our bowls, pre blend them ahead of time and put them in three gallon, what looks like ice cream tubs. So we were able to scoop to order so you can get through the store very quick because The challenge we ran into at the beginning was it takes 40 seconds to load the blender. takes 45 seconds to a minute and 25 to blend the thing. And then I got to put in the bowl and I have to give you toppings.

It's a four or five minute experience. If you're the eighth person in line, you're waiting a long time for a smoothie or a bowl. Today I can get through the line much faster. We can give it to you just as fast as a Chipotle can, you know, fill your taco bowl.

We can create your ever bowl, whatever variety. We have seven to 10 base flavors that are available. You can mix and match them so you don't have to just have acai. And we mix and match them with things like pitaya, blue magic, which is spirulina.

And it's mixed with some fun flavors, coconut, vanilla, chocolate, mango, a whole host of others were coming out with this summer. don't know when this is going to air, so I don't want to drop names that ⁓ here the point of it is to make fun, flavorful bowls that you like and allow you to take them to go and then the toppings, you get to load them with the toppings like you would in a, in a yogurt place, like where you see them we're, top them for you. You don't touch it, but you can choose.

We have a whatever bowl. So you can choose or you can pick one of our existing. And the spirit of wherever we'll start it. also have smoothies.

And again, we're expanding into other, ⁓ other as well from the salads and sandwiches and wraps to ⁓ other So, ⁓ you're going to have access to those things, but the concept itself was again, not fast food. good food fast, and that's kind of where we want, or better food fast, if you will, and we're the better for you. So we're trying to meet everyone where they are and help you in that journey. You should definitely try Everbolt or one of the other players in our category.

I don't compete with them. I'm competing with McDonald's. So if you like one of the air quote competitors to Everbolt because we sell the same thing, please go there and go there a lot. It's better for you.

It's going to help you be a better version of you. And the goal of the business is simplicity. want no cooking. I want repeated food where isn't like, know, a Big Mac tastes the same every McDonald's you go to.

I need our bowls to taste the same, smoothies, our products to taste the same everywhere we go to. I need to be able to train and empower the youth to work at our store. So 15 to 25 year olds should be able to manage or run the store. My 20 year old when she was 14, you know, I could train a 14 or 15 year old not to run the store, but to operate and treat customers.

I can do that in a couple hours. So it's not hard. It's not sophisticated labor. doesn't require, you know, very specialty individuals who have a degree or are trained in a specific thing.

It's a great entry job for friend makers. You know, we're bullologists. We're here to make friends in the community. We're community driven.

So all of our stores, like in RSM, we want to hire in the community. We want to support the community. We work with the schools. Like we worked with the high school there.

We worked with the middle schools. We sponsor the teams. We want to be part of it. It should be your store because Ever Bowl is for everybody.

The fruit, the food that we're providing comes, but then we want it to be community stores. Not a third place like what Starbucks was doing because you're not going to stay there all day, but familiar faces. You should see the youth of the community. You should feel like it's a meeting point on the go for you to see other friends and community members.

And cheap. And when I say cheap, mean as a business. should be cash on cash return accretive for everybody because the idea of spending a million dollars to build these other boxes and then make a couple hundred grand, it's just a lot of risk. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yes.

Mm-hmm. Jeff: with my company, we build our entire spirit of this is to reduce the cost of build out. So you could build one of our Acai competitors, or you could build one and a half to two stores of ours for the same price. So you're to make money faster, which means you don't have to worry about, my God, I'm in debt to my ears.

I'm never going to make money. Like the goal should be to make money. And should be able to make money in a small footprint without having to sell a ton and be able to give back to the community and cause it's a business. And we got to remember what our businesses are.

So I control our food costs with unevolved. I control the build-out costs with rebuild. So we're fighting every day to make sure that we can defend against inflation, defend against the macro events, and empower our franchisees, our business owners, ⁓ extensions to thrive. And if they thrive, the community thrives.

And how cool it is to Ever Bowl become part of these communities. And when I go to a store in a different community, and it feels different, but the food's the same. And that's when I know we're winning. And so Ultimately, that's what we're after on the business side.

So if you're a customer, which you are now Jeremy, because we're going to keep opening. Yes. As a customer though, you want to feel, it needs to feel comfortable. needs to feel like however you feel in your community, it should feel in the store.

It'll look, it won't look necessarily like your community, but it'll feel like it because your community is the And then. Jeremy Julian - RTG: I'm gonna go find my local ones. Jeff: on an ownership side, it should be something of a business where you should be able to beat the cash on cash return of other opportunities. And it's a very low entry point.

mean, there's not a lot of franchises that, you know, a lot of the time for under 200 grand, you've covered absolutely everything you're in business. you know, a lot of times, I don't know, know, the FTDs will give you the real numbers, but we've had stores open for under 100 grand all the way to, you know, over 200, if it's a brand new from the ground buildup, but These second gen restaurant opportunities like the former Menchie's, you can turn these things over pretty quick.

with WeBuild, you know, our fastest turnaround is 23 days from lease signing. We were open and selling bowls. So that's me. And we control a lot of the things and we have all the railways getting built and it's fun, man.

It's a community of people who are happy. And the best thing I'm going to leave you with on business, which is actually what I didn't realize until after I had my own stores and I had 28 of my own before I franchised. So I know the store level of stuff is. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Wow, that's incredible.

Jeff: When someone's having a bad day, they don't usually come and eat better for you food. So the customer is happier versus in some types of food. That's the, I'm mad, I'm upset, I'm going to go eat that. Right.

Yeah. So as I tell my staff, just, you don't have to make their day. You just have to be part of it and don't ruin it. Right.

And if they're, if we mess up, give it to them. I mean, it's a, it's a, it's an acai bowl here. We're not curing cancer. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Don't go on a dive bar, right?

They're coming there when they're commiserating something, right? Jeff: It's not a filet mignon steak that costs us $100. Let the customer have a great day and let's just be a part of it. Our whole business is based on two rules, make friends and have fun.

And that's what every employee who works at the company knows. Those are the only two rules to work here is make friends and have fun, treat everyone like a friend and have some fun. Let's help everybody be a version of themselves. Jeremy Julian - RTG: That's awesome.

Real quick, just because ⁓ just want to clarify, ⁓ is primarily a meal replacement or ⁓ is a full meal. It is not an add on. ⁓ I think of Baskin-Robbins, you said for the older generation, Baskin-Robbins ⁓ a dessert. ⁓ a ⁓ ⁓ opportunity.

⁓ guess for me, anytime I've ever experienced it, it's been a full meal. It's been a lunch, it's been a breakfast. ⁓ been something like that. And so just wanted to clarify that before we got too far away from that.

Jeff: ⁓ absolutely. Yes. I was just using Baskin-Robbins for the, how the business flow. When you walk in, there's, there's dipping cabinet.

pick your, you pick your ice cream. And then if you want a topping, you get it here, you're going to pick your bases and then the toppings we're going to be on top. So I was just trying to help people visualize, but it is absolutely not just a dessert. We do have dessert items.

We have an Everwich, which is an unbelievable reinvention of the ice cream cookie sandwich. And we're coming out with some fun other stuff, but we are a, it could be a, it could be a snack or a meal replacement. ⁓ or a smoothie add-on after a workout with the proteins. Like we fit all the different markets, but our biggest time of day is lunch.

That's predominantly when we ⁓ the most product. Breakfast and then, know, it Like we have a good night crowd if it's a college area and college campuses are, and near colleges are fantastic. But this is a grocery anchor type box that, you know, you can get into a very small footprint, smallest stores are 400 square feet. And we turn a lot of business through 400 because you don't need the tables and chairs We don't need hoods and ovens and grease traps unless it's a locally required for the for the jurisdiction, but our business model doesn't require it and There is no, know, there's not cooking things from scratch and there's not a lot of sophistication in the preparation So everything comes pre-prepared because of how it's a how it has to be and here we go Jeremy Julian - RTG: Well, and the thing that I love about your guest concept, Jeff, is the idea that you guys are hitting the demographic that is that demographic that so many other brands that are out here are looking to figure out how do I get in front of that 18 to 25, 18 to 30 year old because yes, McDonald's, Burger King talk about they're not resonating with those, with those, you know, with your daughter's age, my daughter, my son's age, you know, consumers.

And so the fact that you guys are there, really serving that clientele, especially on college campuses and doing it in a way that that truly your guys' vision to kind of change the world is awesome. I love that. Jeff: Thank you. Yeah, thank you.

No, you know, it's important and we're doing our part. And I think that that as we are able to change the behavior of the consumer, it's forcing the McDonald's and the Burger Kings to rethink what they're offering. And at a minimum, they're starting to offer more improvements around better food. The McPlant, I think, I don't know if it's still around, but I know when I tried that the challenge for them is you're an unhealthy restaurant.

It's hard to get healthy people to go there and experience it for the first time. Healthy restaurant can get someone who's unhealthy to come easier than a healthy an unhealthy restaurant can get someone who is healthy to come And so we're trying to do that by you know, cuz I get I got a lot of flack for a few of the decisions over the years where I brought in things that are not healthy or better for you junk not ⁓ &Ms, but a Better ⁓ if you will it wasn't chocolate, but I'm just giving you an example and had a struggle with it for a while until I realized Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yeah, absolutely.

Jeff: Everybody is at a different spot in their journey, right? And so if you are eating and we're all about Kaizen and getting 1 % better and improvements every time, every day just get a little bit better, right? So if you're never eating fruit at all on your diet I have to sell you a product or give you an offering that is delicious to you and not very good for you, but it has one blueberry on it. Well, that's a small micro improvement.

It's not something that I would want to eat necessarily, or you may want to eat, but that individual does. And guess what? they're feeling better, got a blueberry. So if tomorrow they come in and they get two blueberries, and then the next day they get a strawberry, and over time we bridge them from where they were to where now they're eating better, then we're doing our part.

And I don't think it's right of customers or competitors or anyone to judge any brand that is trying to do it. So I applaud McDonald's for trying its best to better. ⁓ McPlant and all. ⁓ laugh and make jokes, but I actually think it's great.

because their consumer may one day decide, you know what, today I'm going to try it. And it may not be as good as it could be, but for them, that's a step. And we have to help each other all get out of this epidemic in America of obesity and heart disease and stroke and all these things that are being tied to lifestyle, nutrition and diet. And we eat more than we work out no matter who you are.

So every day you're going to eat. So let's help people do better because whether it's a food desert or it's, you work and you only have a 30 minute window or you didn't grow up in an environment that was educating you or gave you the opportunity to develop the eating habits, people have to do better and we have to help everybody. And so if the brands that are opening restaurants in every town in America don't take some onus in that goal, then we're part of the problem. And it's funny, cause I say that to tell you that we have to less than better for you food in order to accomplish that because I got to get you into the store.

And that's the way you do it. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yep. Yeah, you got to make a name for yourself. And I would say that especially traveling as much as I have for the kids in the last couple of months with sports and whatnot, it's like you get certain places.

You're like, there's no options. It's McDonald's, it's Burger King, it's Pizza Hut, it's crap. And it's really hard to eat healthy as a family in some of these places because you're traveling, you you're traveling. And when you're there and then you're like, I don't know if I want to go to this place because I have no idea what it is.

to your point, I applaud you guys for taking on that challenge. You talked a little bit about unit economic chef. I'd love for you to kind of just talk a little bit about, know, we'd love for people to explore the brand and see if it fits for them. What is that going to look like?

What can they expect? Where are you guys looking to grow? You know, I give the give the overall footprint. You you scolded me for not knowing that I had some stores here in Dallas.

I will be going. I will be going to check it out. I apologize. I yeah.

OK, OK. Yeah, you may you may get a selfie from me out in front of the store next time I go. But but but. Jeff: No!

Download the app download the app and get on the rewards program that way you always know Jeremy with all the new things coming. It's important Jeremy Julian - RTG: But talk a little bit about where are you guys at geographically and are you guys a master franchise type group where you got to build six or eight of them or are you guys single store? Talk to me a little bit about your guys' franchising model because I know that's part of your guys' growth strategy. Jeff: Yeah.

So we're from Hawaii to Boston and Florida to Oregon. know, we're in 32 states and growing. We have a hundred locations and growing airports, college campuses. We're opening our two first two airports this year, stadiums for the non-trad world.

do festivals and pop-ups and then traditional stores. We have all of the above as far as we do have some master franchisees. We don't just need to do many of those anymore. We do what's called, you know, area developers.

they'll pick up three, four, five, 10, however many stores make sense based on their internal corporate apparatus to support that, if they're, you but it doesn't matter whether you start with one or you start with 20. The thing I hated about franchising, why I never was gonna do it, was it felt like a ⁓ only for the successful wealthy to continue to expand their wealth, but not for the every man and woman in America who wants to take control of their financial freedom and join a franchise.

I also... didn't like franchising because I felt like there were winners and losers. And I was like, well, how do you be on a team when half are losing or 20 % are losing? Like, how do you do that?

And then the statistics, you see the statistics, nine out 10 restaurants fail, seven point three out of 10 franchises succeed over the same duration of time. It's like, okay, franchising is a lot better for a lot of reasons. And had I known this at the start and there was franchises that I was aware of, I probably would have franchised and not opened Ever Bowl. There was a lot less brain damage and work, but.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: Mm-hmm. Jeff: I didn't know and here I am. So franchising, we started franchising after COVID in 2020, basically 2021. Started in 2016, just all corporate was just doing them, gonna do them myself, know, grow and not ever do it.

And for franchising as the core thing, like we're trying to open in every community in America. So if you have a community, but for us it's about winning locations. Now we have data, you know, we didn't defer, so I was signing leases based on gut. I'm not perfect.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: Okay. Jeff: ⁓ Yeah. Jeremy Julian - RTG: There's a reason why so many restaurants fail because they go, oh, everybody's going to want to show up to my place and I'm not picking on you. But all too often people are like, dude, this is going to be a great shopping center.

like, yeah, the demographic that you guys are looking for is not in this area. So how are you going to actually make money? Jeff: No. Well, take the RSM location.

You know what hurt us was the ingress egress, the time of day that the consumer was going, that we would need them. It was a pain in the ass to get to our center because there's a 100 % because you had to make that U-turn. Yeah, because the traffic's going this way at that time. They had to make this U-turn.

It was a long light. It was hard to get. Parking was weird. And if you're rushing for lunch or work, yeah.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: Your store was a pain in the ass to get to. I've been in that shopping center a hundred times. Yeah, you got it. Yeah, parking, we said to loop around and get into that back.

I've been to that Rubio's in that corner, that corner, that shopping center multiple times in my life. Yeah, no, 100%. Jeff: Yes. Yes.

How do you account for that when you don't know what you're doing? Because on it, and then, we opened in a town in San Diego called Hillcrest and the demographics on paper were amazing. High household income, high population density. But only one Jersey Mike's failed in San Diego also, and it was in the same community.

It's because the demographics can't always tell the whole story, right? You've got to learn about it. And I didn't have data back then either. And I wasn't even thinking about data.

I was like, well, I can build these so cheap. These are mine. I'm just going to open them. Boom, boom, boom, boom.

And I'm, know, Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yep. Yeah. Jeff: Year one, we opened four, year two, 14 more stores. So in the first 24 months, we had 18 stores.

Like you think we were paying attention to real estate data? We were not. Not at all. I was putting dots on a map and saying, I want to go here.

And I learned a lot from that. So today we have a much better real estate strategy. We have a real estate committee internally. We'll tell you no, even though we don't make any money until you open a store.

So it's not in our financial interest to tell you no, but it is because we want you to win. We need you to win. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Jeff: I want to sell more franchises to my existing franchisees. I don't want to always have to sell a new franchise to a new person and none of my existing franchisees want to grow. That means we're not winning for them.

know, our large franchisee with open boxes started with one and now has 18 and just bought seven more. I like that story. And I like that story because that means that they're winning. And so we've got to help win.

You know, we're opening a store. I don't know when this is going to air, but this week, our second store in Hawaii, that franchisee is crushing it. Jeremy Julian - RTG: That's great. Jeff: and they're looking for a third one now.

It's the spirit of that which drives our decision making. And that decision making on the real estate side is so critical because location, location, location means a lot more than just how many people are right around you. it's ingress, egress, it's time of day, it's ⁓ visibility. We opened a store in Tampa and on paper it looked great, but there was a big box that blocked the view of this tiny little store in line that unless you had the right angle, you didn't see it.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: I'm saying grassy grass that's walking traffic versus driving traffic. There's so many things that people don't think about it. Yeah. Jeff: half the people that were going to that grocery anchored center, which on a piece of paper looked wonderful, they wouldn't see the store.

So even if I tell you it's there, I have to communicate with you for you to know that it's there. That's the challenge versus the walker bike traffic and co-tenancy because of the veto, right? You got to think about co-tenancy of you and me want to go to lunch right now. I want an acai bowl, you want a burger.

Well, we can't go to every bowl alone. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Mm-hmm. Yeah, or a Jersey Mike sub just next door. It's like, you know, you can do that.

There's a buddy of mine opened up a place here in town. I live in a little small little 10 person, I mean, 10,000 person town. Same idea. He's like, dude, nobody wanted to go to poke and they hadn't built out the rest of the center.

So he ultimately failed after three years, not because he didn't do well, but you can only have poke so often and there was nothing else to go. And so all of the business users and all the users in town were like, dude, ⁓ don't feel like poke and there's nothing else there. There's not a burger place. There's not a wing place.

There's not a Jeff: Yes. Jeremy Julian - RTG: you know, a sandwich place. now it's Mediterranean place and a burger place and yeah. Jeff: Yeah, it'll keep rotating.

And then you have the parking issue, not just parking spots, but we have a spot in the center with a Chick-fil-A. I can tell you, at lunchtime, that Chick-fil-A line wraps around and blocks ingress to our side of the parking lot. It's a pain in the ass. So yes, I'm going to get the diehard customers to deal with it.

But if you're in a hurry and you're in the car with my daughter and she goes, Dad, can we go to Ever Bowl? I'm like, ⁓ in a hurry. if I'm like, yeah, I'll call it. I know, but to get through the parking lot and it's just, later.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yep. Jeff: I just lost a customer because of Chick-fil-A's parking. drive-through line. So you've got to really pay attention to all of these things.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yeah, not because this unit wasn't successful, but you had a hard time because of time, because of ingress egress, and I love that. So if people want to learn more, are they jumping on the site? Are they calling you? I'm assuming that you got a system for this.

where would you send them to go figure out if this is the right fit for them? Jeff: So anyway, there's a lot. Absolutely. So definitely go to everworld.

com and take a look. ⁓ Fill out the form. Obviously today we do have a system. It's, it's, you know, I will say we're still a teenager though, and it's important.

So you can choose when you want to join a brand, right? You joined the McDonald's today. If you, you're lucky enough to get one, cause I don't think you can, you don't have a lot of room to grow, but they have everything figured out. You're not going to have any like, ⁓ gosh, they don't know what they're doing over there.

you can join a five unit chain that decided to franchise early and it's going to be a lot of like, ⁓ my gosh, are we ever going to know how to tie our shoes? And then you could join. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Mm-hmm. Jeff: kind of us, which is a young adult brand.

we're, we're, finally hit that hundred area, which is a hard thing to do. So it means we're stable enough, but I'll, we're a teenager. I mean, some days we, we sound like grownups and look like them. And sometimes we sound like a child and have no experience on things because we have to learn as we go to.

So there are going to be things that we are going to run into that is going to be frustrating or we're going to have to work on it together. But the growth opportunity to grow with us is there because you could go from one store to 50 with a brand of our size. So it's really about where your risk tolerance is and what you're looking for. If you want.

conservative stability, no, no, no, no, no growth. Then you want that if you want hyper growth and you're a want to bet, you probably want to go even smaller than us. And if you want somewhere in the middle where you want to be part of it, you can see it. You want to be a part of the fraternity of Everbow franchise owners and help us grow it.

Then, you know, our size is a good size. So I think that that's one element, but go to our website, ask questions. I say this to any potential franchise you have ever spoken to scrutinize the hell out of it. Find a reason not to open an Everbow seriously, like pick it apart.

and keep talking yourself out of doing it. And we're going to do the same about you because it is a marriage and we had to learn that also, just like locations. We have selected the franchisees, not that they're bad franchisees because that's not fair to them. It wasn't a good fit for what their expectation was.

Your expectation, if you want to make $2 million out of one of our stores, we're not going to deliver for you. We're not. And if you want to come in and do it your way and not have any of the situations where you're going to have to follow the brand standard, even though you don't like it. Jeremy Julian - RTG: Values aren't aligned.

Yeah. Yep. Jeff: We're not for you either. And conversely, if you want to be part of it though, and you want to, you, your ethos is tied to our values and you're about helping everyone get better and you like healthier and better for you food and you want a community driven thing and you like the idea of opening many boxes or even one and, being part of it and driving it, then you should definitely, cause there, you can make a lot of money with us, but you can also fail like you can with everybody.

We're not going to, we're gonna do everything we can to prevent that. So if we say no on a piece of real estate, even though you know your community better than we do, and you know, this is the perfect spot. Trust me when I tell you, I've said yes to that before and they never perform as well as what we do now. Cause our last 30 boxes are our best cohort of boxes when we use the data.

So we're going to help you. That's why you join a franchise. We are here to support everything you're doing from real estate to marketing to hiring and training and operations to food control, cost controls, to labor controls, to scheduling, to how you build out this thing. So you can empower yourself to make money because forget the food and forget why we do this and why we started.

It's a business. And we have to take that seriously. And I want you to make money if you join us. And so we're going to work together.

And I want you to challenge and push us too. I the Egg McMuffin and the Big Mac were created by franchisees. So we want your ideas as well. We want you to in the areas of innovation and disruption.

And that's what this is cool. So definitely go to our website. We're going to take you through the process. You're going to speak to someone on our team.

You're going to speak to other franchisees. We're going to go through that process, have you fill out the form. And if it makes sense, it makes sense. It's a lower investment.

So my goal would be to help you open two for the price of one. That's our goal and help you amortize expenses and really own markets. you know, I don't know where everyone is living, but I know where Jeremy is and we're going to bring one to Jeremy. So he can't, he can't avoid evermore because that's ⁓ a good excuse.

Yeah, we got, we're going to, I'm going to fix this Jeremy. I'm going to, I'm going to do what I got to do here. Jeremy Julian - RTG: I can't have an excuse why I haven't had an ever bowl lately. I love that.

Awesome. Well, the thing you tease about being a teenager, the fact that you guys have figured out so much of the supply chain and stuff. I just got back from a 45 unit brand that has hired some people from some brands that have grown from 50 to 200, 600, 500. And they're in that same stage as that growth stage of trying to figure it out.

And so I love that you put that out there, that you guys have figured some of the stuff out, but there's going to be stuff you guys are still going to stub your toe on. and not make it easy at first, but with communication and with value alignment, it's where you can figure it out and both of you guys can make money, as you said. Jeff: That's right. That's right.

And that's the, that's the fun part of entrepreneurship, Is getting to do those things and being a business owner and doing it together. Because a lot of times you do it solo and having the fact that we have, you know, 50, 50 other people that are in the same position as you doing the same thing, charging up the same Hill in their own community. What are the wins that we're winning? Where are the, where are the falters?

And every day we get better and mistakes are great once twice as a choice. So choose not to make mistakes. We'll make them. And I promise you, we will.

But just as fast as we make them, we're gonna clean it up and we're gonna solidify it and together we're gonna do it that's part of the story. So again, you gotta want that part of the story and where I've learned the most is you need to understand what your expectations are for this to be a win for you and see if Everbow or whoever you're looking at can deliver that. And if the answer is yes, great. And vice versa, I want to be a win for us.

So if your expectations are met, you're not happy. And like all things in life, we spend 90 % of our time dealing with the 10 % of the problem. Jeremy Julian - RTG: sense. Mm-hmm.

Jeff: That is the problem. And I don't want to be a problem for you. And I want you to be happy with the business and the decisions. And I want you to be happy that you picked the right brand.

So it's very important you court whatever franchise, scrutinize, ask to speak to existing franchisees. And if they're lying, if they have no problems and they're perfect, run as fast as you can. ⁓ Jeremy Julian - RTG: Yeah, exactly. Somebody's lying to you.

All right. I'm gonna break it down real quick, Jeff. For those that have never been to a Never Bowl, ⁓ is your go-to item that would tell somebody to go get ⁓ if listened for ⁓ 35 that we've been talking and they've never been, they see it in the shopping center like, dude, I gotta go check that out. ⁓ What's go-to and then what's Jeff's special ⁓ item?

you've had it now for 10 years, ⁓ you've mixed and matched stuff for yourself ⁓ over time, but I'd love for you ⁓ to everybody kind of what is your go-to? ⁓ you you're bringing somebody for the brand to the brand for the first time that they have to have, ⁓ that really makes, it stand out. Jeff: Well, here's the beauty of that. And I wish I had a simple answer for you, but the answer is a medium or large bowl.

You just try all the samples. You can ask for free samples of all the flavors so you can know what goes together, what you like. But if you like tropical, then I would go with the coconut or the mango or the Blue Magic or the Pattaya. And if you like more berry driven, then you're probably gonna wanna lean more towards the acai.

if you don't know and you've never had an acai bowl, you gotta go acai. Go try the Ever Bowl. It's the mainstay, it's what this company was built off of. it's also, know, add some granola, blueberries, strawberry and banana.

You can choose to sweeten it up if you want or add a nut butter, but ultimately that is the, that's our number one. I mean, that's what we sell the most of. Jeff's go to, it changes because I, there are all these flavors and, but I mean, I've eaten thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of these bowls. Jeremy Julian - RTG: ⁓ huh.

before my wife grew up going to In-N-Out and the way she orders In-N-Out is different than any other burger that she's ever made. I'm like, babe, this is the weirdest thing, but she grew up in high school and early college, working at In-N-Out when it was still like 50 stores. And so her and I joke about it. like, I've never seen her eat a burger the same way, but she worked at In-N-Out so many days ⁓ you end up coming up with stuff.

So that's why I ask, especially restaurant founders, that where does that go? Jeff: And I'll tell you that, but first I want to say I just learned for the first time that In-N-Out gives free coffee through the drive-through. Did you know that? I did not know that.

It's true. Anyway, so my go-to right now, if I was going to go to Never Bowl today, this is what I would do. I would order a half acai and half vanilla bowl. No granola.

I want the goji berries in the base because they're chewy on top. But once they're the base, they get cold and they snap. So I like that way they snap with cacao nibs. Banana.

And I sometimes do blueberry and I sometimes do strawberry. I don't usually do both. In the summer months, I tend to do strawberries. Like now I'd probably do strawberry.

⁓ reason I don't do both is just because I feel like I don't get the full flavor of them two. So that's what I would do today is no granola, cacao nibs and goji berries. And I would want the goji berries first. So they get cold in the frozen base, acai, vanilla.

And today I would do bananas and strawberries, no honey, nothing else added. And I would do a large because you'll go or go home. Yeah, you always want a little more. I'd rather have a little extra and not want it than want a little bit more.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: It's delicious. I love it. Yeah, and have to deal with the Chick-fil-A line to get back in line to get another ball, right? Jeff: Wow.

And by the way, you know, you could also do this with our bowls. We went on QVC after COVID and we used to sell later bowls. So you could actually order bowls from us in the base without the toppings and stick them in your freezer if you don't want to come visit us or you want to do meal prep. I mean, listen, I'm self-serving.

Here's a pitch. So this is a commercial, you know, order now and ⁓ wait, we'll give you two for the price of one. ⁓ realistically, you know, we've had tons of of people who have Jeremy Julian - RTG: You Jeff: Ordered a couple to go for tomorrow or for later. They're great on airplanes.

You put it your freezer tonight if you have a flight tomorrow. You even put the fresh fruit on. You pull it out when you go to the airport. By the time you're sitting on that airplane, it's thawed out.

It's so good on an airplane. There's no smell. And it's just rewarding. And everyone looks at you and they are just jealous.

Jeremy Julian - RTG: I love that. That's really cool. Awesome. Well, Jeff, thank you for building a brand.

And I say this wholeheartedly because I get a chance to talk to a lot of people on these episodes that truly is trying to make a difference, not just in the local communities, in the health of America, and just across the board because it probably would have been easier to start a burger concept. at the end of the day, yeah, absolutely. So thank you for coming on. Thank you for sharing the story.

What was that? Jeff: Probably. It's amazing how many burgers people eat, so absolutely. I'll tell you what you did in there.

I said I was being a joke. said I'll tell you what you did there, but you're gonna download the app, Jeremy, and you're gonna send me a picture in Dallas. You owe it to me. I'll pay for your bowl.

I'll pay for the bowl. You go eat it. Jeremy Julian - RTG: I got to figure it out. I was just on another tab on my browser.

I figured out the closest store to the office. The closest store to here is probably 15 miles, so I might not be hitting it. But over by the office, I'll figure that piece out for sure. Awesome.

Well, Jeff, thank you for jumping on. As I said at the on-site listeners, please go check out Ever Bowl. Really, really cool concept, again. Having gone with my best friend back when I lived in California, really, really cool.

So Jeff, thank you. And to our listeners, make it a great day. Jeff: And I'll pay for it. I'll pay for it.

It's my treat. Thank you so much and thanks for having me.