CAVA founders underpriced early menu items by forgetting ingredients shrink when cooked
Ted Xenohristos · CAVA: Ted Xenohristos and Brett Schulman · Nov 27, 2023 · at 25:33
CAVA co-founder Ted Xenohristos discusses early operational and food costing blunders during the launch of the original full-service Cava Mezze restaurant.
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“We were bringing an octopus and let's just say the octopus weighed 40 pounds. We would divide that by the ounces that we served, and we were like, great, we can serve octopus for six bucks. Well, we didn't take into account that once we cooked that octopus off, that 40 pounds became 18 pounds, and so all the loss in that, we didn't capture that in the pricing, so we were really giving away octopus for way less than you could buy anywhere in the world, probably, and we did the same for scallops and lamb chops, and we were kind of Getting busier and busier and losing more and more money.”
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