Lifestyle The Toasted Yolk opened initially with hope for massive expansion Published 3 years ago on April 9, 2021 By Lamar Davis Editor Share Tweet DOTHAN, Ala. – What’s your background? We opened in Conroe, our first one, in August 2010. We struggled like any small business does its first couple of years, then it kind of took off about year two. We had an opportunity to do our second one in 2014, so from there we decided we were going to do corporate locations. But we had a bunch of people reaching out that wanted to see if we would franchise, and we thought that both would make a good expansion model. We started franchising in 2017, and here we sit today with six corporate stores, nine franchise locations and another three being built currently, (with) another seven or eight on the way. Talk a little bit about your decision to go outside of Houston. We’ve sold the San Antonio market, we’ve got one being built in College Station, and we’ve got three sold in Dallas. We’ve been moving out of Houston. I think Covid kind of slowed us down a little bit, to where people put their building plans on hold, but as far as the expansion goes, that was always the intent. Houston is pretty much full. We’ve got a pocket here or there, but that’s pretty much done. Our plan has always been to expand, if not nationwide but definitely the Southeastern United States. Tell me what it’s like to go from a family-owned model to multiple franchisees in multiple states. Pretty wild and crazy. My business partner and I, Mathew DeMott, we had both been in the restaurant business for many years. Our last stop was at Luby’s. We decided at that time we wanted to do something on our own. We knew that breakfast seemed to be a pretty underserved market at that time in 2010; there weren’t nearly as many breakfast locations outside the Denny’s and IHOPs that you see today. We opened with the intention of expanding. We didn’t think it would take as long as it did, but that was always our intent. I think most people, when they open up a restaurant, (they) have some anticipation of expanding, but it just doesn’t always work out that way. We weren’t … going to be outworked, and we really think we’ve tapped into something that isn’t out there. It’s definitely unique. The breakfast segment right now is, out of all the restaurant categories, still exploding. Related Topics: Up Next Amazon warehouse workers in Alabama give thumbs-down to union Don't Miss Pandemic creates opportunity for music vacations Advertisement Trending
