This week on Extra Serving, a podcast from Nation’s Restaurant News and the Last Bite Network, the team covered this week’s most urgent news: vaccine mandates. Digital editor Holly Petre, senior editor Lisa Jennings and editor-in-chief Sam Oches talked about the impact of vaccine mandates on restaurants. Immediately following the conversation, President Joe Biden announced that the Department of Labor will require all workplaces with 100 or more employees to mandate vaccines or negative weekly tests.
Also, the NRN team discussed Hurricane Ida’s impact on restaurants, including what the rising tide of climate change could mean for the industry and how it can help prevent storms from getting worse. Petre, Jennings and Oches also discuss the string of wildfires in the Northwest last year and how that impacted chains like Dutch Bros.
Finally, Petre, Jennings and Oches reviewed the latest IPOs from morning daypart companies First Watch and Dutch Bros. The latter filed for an IPO in June but announced this week it is seeking a $3.3 billion valuation; the former company filed paperwork this week, but the number of shares and price range have not yet been determined.
For this week’s interview, Jennings spoke with the CEO of Jack in the Box, Darin Harris, about the future of the quick-service company. A little over a year into his tenure with the brand, Harris talked about how he is expanding the company’s reach into new markets.
Check out the latest episode of Take-Away with Sam Oches here and register for CREATE here.