Blaze Pizza, Farmer Boys, Mike's Red Tacos, HigherMe experts discuss recruitment, retention

by Mandy Wolf Detwiler — Editor, Connect Media

Industry experts at the Restaurant Franchising & Innovation Summit emphasized that sustainable restaurant profitability and successful scaling depend on prioritizing the "human heart" of the business through rapid recruitment, authentic culture building and collaborative leadership partnerships.

Meet the Top 30 Movers & Shakers: Restaurant Marketing

by Cherryh Cansler — Publisher, FastCasual.com

We’re proud to honor the 2026 Restaurant Marketing Top 30 Movers & Shakers, who will be recognized at the Restaurant Marketing Workshop on June 2–3 in Boston. Registration is open.

4 places where your catering program is leaking revenue

by Kelly Grogan — Founder, CRUMBS

When you treat every catering order as a relationship worth tending to, the revenue follows. When you treat it as a transaction to fulfill and move on from, you stay stuck chasing new orders because you keep losing the ones you already had.

Bread Zeppelin challenges Panera with 'Salad Stuffer' trade-in offer

More than a decade after Bread Zeppelin created the salad-stuffed baguette, the Dallas-founded brand is leaning into the national spotlight following a similar…

How Tarka Indian Kitchen scaled fast casual Indian cuisine

In this episode of Fast Casual Nation, hosts Paul Barron and Cherryh Cansler sit down with Tinku Saini, CEO and co-founder of Tarka Indian Kitchen, to explore how the Austin-based brand has spent nearly two decades cracking the code on fast casual Indian food.

Franchise Growth Partners

We work closely with new entrepreneurs who want to learn how to franchise a business, as well as existing franchisors in the initial, early or mature stages of franchise system development.

Digital in the Drive-Thru: Designing Outdoor Experiences for QSR Brands

Digital menu boards at the drive-thru are no longer a luxury. In today’s competitive QSR landscape, they’ve become a requirement.

2025 Fast Casual Top 100 Movers & Shakers

This year, the exceptional caliber of leadership across the industry led to a slight adjustment in our numbers—we were compelled to recognize 100 brands and 25 executives instead of our usual 75- 25 split. We also added an extra executive, a testament to the fierce competition and outstanding contributions within the fast-casual arena.