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In today’s weekly wrap episode of The Restaurant Report, host Paul Barron looks at fast food embracing technology, explores the future of automation to address labor shortages and dives into Shake Shack’s growth plans as well as Fat Brands newest acquisition.

Three Key Points:

Shake Shake’s Q3 earnings call was released and chief executive officer Randy Garutti shared details on the expansion for 2022, expecting to develop forty-five to fifty company-operated stores and adding walk up windows, drive up, and drive-thrus to about twenty-five percent of them.

The pressure of labor shortages increase as people continue to leave their jobs and autonomous drone delivery will come into play. Barron talks about Flytrex, Dominos, Nuro’s latest development and more. McDonalds and Burger King are expanding with AI in the drive-thru side but Barron says that autonomous voice ordering will take over AI.

Fat Brands announced the acquisition of Fazoli’s for one hundred and thirty million dollars, Barron asks, “Is this a buy or a bust?” Fat Brands has also acquired Twin Peaks from Garnett Station Partners for three hundred million.


Tweetable Quotes:

“Most restaurant operators right now are still dealing with old tech and old formats when it comes to managing labor.” - Paul Barron

“This is getting so dystopian, I feel like hospitality, where is it going?” - Paul Barron

“You’ve got to figure out the solution that is going to deal with both autonomy speed technology and hospitality on the same side and that I think is going to be the holy grail for the restaurant industry.” - Paul Barron