Kyle Inserra is a restaurant growth strategist, thought leader, and current advisor with Sabre Real Estate Advisors. He started his career in the corporate finance and advertising industry, but changed careers and found his passion in the restaurant business (like many do!) After attending the French Culinary Institute and cooking around the world, he opened his own restaurant in 2007 and is now the host of the National Restaurant Owners podcast.

Kyle brought his smooth podcasting skills and valuable info to this episode of Give an Ovation. Here are a few tidbits:

Trendy restaurant ideas like ghost kitchens and drive-thrus sound sexy, but Kyle pointed out that they aren’t for everyone. For example, people underestimate the work that goes into a virtual concept. It’s a real online business that requires e-commerce resources and capabilities to do successfully.

Instead, Kyle recommends focusing on the fundamentals of restaurant ownership and the lessons learned in recent years.

In this off-premise environment, packaging goes a long way towards differentiation. What are the little, unexpected things you can do to get people to say, ‘wow, that’s cool’?

At Kyle’s last restaurant they were including QR codes linking to their in-location Spotify playlist to bring some of the guest experience to people’s homes. People loved it!

5) Stay Strong, Get Funded, Be Opportunistic

There are plenty of opportunities and deals in real estate and elsewhere to take advantage of. Kyle anticipates a boom in the industry and foresees it being “tremendously successful” going forward.