How to Build a Restaurant That Can Grow Profitably: Randy Sharpe, Wahlburgers

**Josh Kopel** (0:00)
What are you doing this month to make sure your business grows? Do you mind if I make a suggestion? This month's free Restaurant Marketing Master Class is about one thing, using AI to create an unfair advantage. And not by replacing what makes your restaurant special, but by helping you move faster on the work that actually drives growth. I'm taking my proven tactics, tools and strategies and showing you how to use AI to sharpen your marketing, speed up execution and turn good ideas into action without getting buried in the details. You'll be working with me personally to build these strategies into your business in real time. And because of that, space is limited, but you can sign up for free today by going to restaurantbusinessschool.com.
Again, you can sign up for free today just by going to restaurantbusinessschool.com. I'll see you there. Now here we go.

**Randy Sharpe** (0:54)
The first question is, why do you want to be a Wahlburgers franchisee? And if it's because I want to get closer to meet Mark Wahlberg, we're saying no. And that's typically there's so many great things that you could talk about being the partners of who I'm with. But some of the negative is some people typically want to come around for the wrong reasons.

**Josh Kopel** (1:13)
Welcome to FULL COMP, a show offering insight into the hospitality industry, featuring restauranteurs, thought leaders and innovators. Served up on the house.
Welcome to the 2026 Restaurant Playbook, a special five-part series presented by Square. Opening a restaurant has never been easy, but today's operators are facing a different kind of challenge. It's not enough to have great food, a strong location or a beautiful brand. The restaurants they win in 2026 will be the ones people remember, people actually want, and that are built to survive, grow profitably and scale without breaking. Across this series, I'm sitting down with some of the brightest minds in our industry to unpack what it really takes to open your first restaurant or open your next one smarter. And to help you put these lessons into action, we've created a free companion download, the 2026 Restaurant Playbook. You can grab it now at joshkopel.com/square.
A big thanks to Square for making this series possible and for continuing to support the operators building the future of hospitality. Now let's get into the episode. What if the fastest way to grow your restaurant wasn't adding more but removing what doesn't belong? Randy Sharpe walked into Wahlburgers and found a brand buried under complexity. 17 menus, scattered identity, and inconsistent execution. And instead of scaling it, he stripped it down, and the result was amazing. A sharper brand, stronger performance, and double digit growth in a market where most of us are fighting just to stay flat. In today's conversation, we break down how Randy redefined what the brand stands for. Why celebrity is fuel, not the engine, and the hard decisions required to cut underperforming locations and reclaim control. If your restaurant group feels bloated or unfocused, this is your playbook for getting back to what actually works.

**Randy Sharpe** (3:16)
Well, I've been in the industry going on 32 years.
Started out as a way to put myself through school and fell in love with it and end up moving up throughout the ranks. I was general manager for many years, a couple of different concepts, and regional, and then vice president. And I became a CEO in 2018 for a company that at that time had 52 restaurants, five brands. And fast forward five years later, we were at about 100 restaurants, 12 brands, and just a super dynamic growth vehicle from fine dining to casual dining and all kinds of fun things. And I met actually met Mark Wahlberg at a luncheon. He's obviously affiliated with Fletcher's with tequila. I sold a lot of tequila.
Got to meet him, have lunch. It was a small group, but he immediately sat next to me and start talking to me. Want to know about what I did and why, this and that and other and start talking about his family and it's almost like this gentleman is just talking to me like we've been friends.
Got to know him a little bit. We were doing a couple new restaurant openings in New York. He happened to be in New York at the same time. He said he'd meet me there and he wanted to come help sponsor our restaurants. It was just very unique. It's such a popular international celebrity. Had interest not only in his tequila, but obviously was super excited about what he saw and what we did and came down. We got to know each other and a few months into that, he'd pick up the phone every once in a while, call and just say hi and just really got to know me. I was really wondering why. And he could probably be friends with anyone he wants in the world. So why does he keep calling me? Well, he was interested in hiring me and he was doing his homework and he had been talking to folks in the industry and he wanted to get to know me as the person and he offered me an opportunity to come on as a CEO at Wahlburgers and I, again, I knew him at this point and I knew quite a bit about the business, but I just needed to understand a little bit more. Obviously, I had a great position I was in and it just became one of those situations where I needed to get to know a little bit more. So a few months down the road, I'm still asking questions, still talking about it. And it became an opportunity where I needed to make a decision whether I was going to stay where I was for the next five years or move on. And we had talked enough and he got me excited enough about the opportunity where it was going to be this situation where there was a chain that had been around for, at that time, 13 years. It had quite a bit of success, but it really didn't have a direction that was very distinct and whatnot. And I took advantage of the opportunity and I thought it was an exciting challenge. And one thing I did learn was while with Celebrity Own, and Mark is the majority owner of the company, it's a brand that had a great product, has a great product, has even a better product today, but was typically kind of hiding behind that. The way I look at any sponsored brand is, it can't be the engine, it has to be the fuel. And that's really what we focused on when I told Mark when I was coming on board, this brand has to stand on its own. I love the fact that with your 32 million followers, we can get a lot of interest pretty quick in the brand, but I really needed to understand that. And it is a brand that can stand on its own, and it's a brand that is standing on its own. It just, we needed that direction. And I think he was, hey, come on in, whatever you need to do, I'm going to support it. And he has, and it's going on, I just hit my two year anniversary a few months ago, and it's been great.