Epic Kitchens

Epic Kitchens is a multi-unit operator that builds tech and data pipelines at Epic to power their next meal. They bring great brands to great markets. From delivery-only ghost kitchens to a new generation of food halls and everything in between, they offer a tailor-made market presence for their brand partners.

<div>Epic Kitchens is a Chicago- and Atlanta-based hybrid cloud kitchen company preparing menu items from five brands in one kitchen: Pok&eacute;works, Burgerfi, 800 Degrees Pizza, Blue Ribbon Fried Chicken, and Lawrence&rsquo;s Fish and Shrimp. The brands have little overlap in cuisine and all fit into the premium fast-casual segment.</div>

Defining the future of the restaurant business.

Cloud Kitchens

Epic Kitchens Names Three to Board of Directors

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 Epic Kitchens is a Chicago- and Atlanta-based hybrid cloud kitchen company preparing menu items from five brands in one kitchen: Pok&eacute;works, Burgerfi, 800 Degrees Pizza, Blue Ribbon Fried Chicken, and Lawrence&rsquo;s Fish and Shrimp. The brands have little overlap in cuisine and all fit into the premium fast-casual segment.
 
 
 Epic Kitchens partners with third-party delivery services like DoorDash, Grubhub, and UberEats. In October 2021, the company also launched the Epic Kitchens app, to improve delivery margins. The app, which is powered by Lunchbox Technologies, allows consumers the option of ordering multiple brands on the same order. To draw customers on to the platform, the company had plans to offer loyalty programs and a signup bonus.
 
 
 The company initially started off by renting five bays in a CloudKitchens facility near downtown Chicago, using the space to operate 14 restaurant concepts for delivery only. In October 2021, Epic Kitchens transitioned to a hybrid model by opening a brick-and-mortar restaurant in Chicago&rsquo;s Lakeview neighborhood. The restaurant houses four brands and will feature three more, all under a licensing model. At the outlet, customers can only order via Epic&rsquo;s app, self-ordering kiosks in the store, or through third-party delivery providers. The physical location is intended to build brand awareness and build digital sales, while diversifying beyond delivery-only. The restaurant is designed for an off-premise strategy, with a pick-up and delivery area, and in the back-of-house, each brand has its own area in the 750-square-foot kitchen.
 
 
 In July 2022, Epic Kitchens partnered with bopNgrill, a Chicago-based Korean fast-food brand to offer bopNgrill menu items from its kitchen facility located at South Loop. 
 
 
 In July 2021, Epic Kitchens raised USD 5.9 million in a venture funding round launched by two Dallas investors, Blake Wiley and Grant Christopher. As of November 2021, the company had plans to open five more stores in Chicago as well as a location with CloudKitchens. There were also plans to expand into Texas, with Austin being a likely starting point.
 
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 Sweetheart Kitchen is a Dubai-based independent cloud kitchen that owns and operates its own brands. As of February 2022, the company offered 21 cuisine-specific, quick-service food brands across the UAE and Kuwait.
 
 
 The company does not partner with third-party restaurants looking to outsource their delivery volumes but has linked up with third-party aggregators in the region such as Talabat, Zomato, and Carriage for delivery. 
 
 
 In February 2021, the company launched a loyalty program to provide customers with immediate ‘data-based’ rewards with a view to incentivizing specific behaviors such as increasing Average Order Value and frequency of purchase.
 
 
 In October 2020, the company raised USD 17.7 million in a Series C funding round led by Sweetheart Kitchen CEO Peter Schatzberg, with plans to dedicate the funds to launching additional brands and expansion in the UAE, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. To date, the company has received total funding of USD 42.2 million. The company has not revealed any plans to expand to the US or European markets.
 
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Sweetheart Kitchen

REEF Technology (formerly known as ParkJockey Global) is an operator of parking real estate and delivery kitchens in North America. The company transforms urban spaces into community hubs by setting up cloud kitchens, healthcare clinics, retail outlets, and other services in empty parking spaces.REEF kitchens is the company’s turnkey expansion solution for restaurateurs. These are purpose-built commercial kitchens that prepare food ordered online for delivery and pick-up. Each kitchen prepares food for three to five restaurant brands, and REEF manages all operational requirements on behalf of restaurant owners including staffing and day-to-day kitchen management. REEF kitchens are connected to the neighborhood’s most popular food delivery platforms and getREEF (the company’s own delivery platform) via a proprietary delivery management technology. This enables each kitchen to organize and prepare orders for multiple brands. The kitchens operate under a license model as opposed to a flat fee.The company’s brand portfolio includes food brands like Wow Bao, Wayback Burgers, Firenza, Saladworks, and Capriottis and is supplied by Collectiv Food and Crate to Plate. For delivery, the company has partnered with Grubhub, Deliveroo, Postmates, and UberEats.There were over 300 REEF kitchens across key markets in North America and Europe, including cities like Austin, Miami, Chicago, Houston, Portland, Toronto, Edmonton, and London. However, in January 2022, the company temporarily shut down a third of its locations (around 95 sites) due to underperformance and a number of operational challenges including labor shortages, high costs, incomplete permits, and difficulties connecting to utilities. In March 2023, Reef announced plans to discontinue operations of its unprofitable ghost kitchen facilities in a strategic move that focuses on profitability. In <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/33243">August 2024</a>, the company announced plans to close three New York-based facilities with plans to pivot away from ghost kitchens toward micro-fulfillment and technology services.Key customers and partnershipsIn December 2021, REEF acquired 2ndKitchen, a US-based virtual kitchen for hotels, offices, buildings, and other hospitality companies. 2ndKitchen’s existing business will be combined with REEF's brand and will operate under its hospitality division. In November 2021, the company announced the acquisition of iKcon Restaurant LLC, a Dubai-based cloud kitchen operator, marking its first major transaction in the MENA market.REEF also strengthens its reach and customer base through partnerships with other players in the broader cloud kitchen ecosystem including Creating Culinary Communities (C3) and JustKitchen. REEF currently carries C3 brands in its cloud kitchens, and has a partnership with JustKitchen to launch its “Another Wing” brand in South-East Asia. In July 2022 Reef partnered with HUBB Kitchens, a North Carolina-based cloud kitchen facility provider to open a virtual food hall in the Raleigh-Durham International Airport in North Carolina.In March 2022, the company announced a partnership with the fast-casual Mexican restaurant QDOBA to launch 25 pilot locations in Seattle, Austin, and Atlanta. In August 2021, the company partnered with the American fast food chain Wendy’s to open 700 delivery Kitchens across the US, Canada, and the UK by 2025. In May 2023, the two companies announced plans to close down all Wendy’s cloud kitchen locations in the US. In March 2022, the company launched its first fine-dining collaboration with The One Group for its upscale concepts STK, Kona Grill and Bao Yum.

REEF Technology

Combo Kitchen is a Miami-based cloud kitchen partner that connects restaurant brands to franchisees, enabling food entrepreneurs to select and prepare established delivery-only food brands. Combo Kitchen was founded by Hossein Kasmai, the CEO and founder of Franchise Creator Inc., a Miami-based franchise consulting firm.Restaurant owners are invited to join the Combo Kitchen network of concepts, with the intention of expanding their footprint in new markets, growing brand awareness, and increasing foot traffic to key locations. As of February 2022, Combo Kitchen’s network included 28 restaurant brands, including Saladworks, Memphis Wings, Ramen Lab, and Poke Sushi Bowl. With restaurant partners, Combo Kitchen acts as a support team, freeing restaurateurs to only focus on training franchisees in menu preparation.For franchisees (often independent restaurants, bakeries, and cafes with their own kitchen spaces), Combo Kitchen provides support with location scouting, kitchen design and construction, advertising, and POS integrations. By incorporating multiple brands, franchisees are able to grow revenues while leveraging the same kitchen infrastructure. In turn, franchisees submit a one-time entrance fee to join the Combo Kitchen network and pay royalties to Combo Kitchen and the owners of the concepts in exchange for the rights to operate multiple brands in one kitchen.The company has partnered with major third-party food delivery providers such as UberEats, GrubHub, and DoorDash.

Combo Kitchen

Crave Hospitality Group is an independent cloud kitchen operator that provides delivery-only restaurant brands. The company’s virtual brands include The Flying Rooster, Madre's Flatbread, Big Reds Burgers &amp; Grill, Brownstone Pizza, The Red Crane, and The Twisted Cactus.The company was initially known for its food delivery company (“Crave Delivery”) before it decided to change its business model by launching into cloud kitchens (“Crave Collective”) in November 2020. As of September 2023, the company operates 4 kitchen locations.The company’s business is powered by its own proprietary software (“Crave Technology”) for multi-brand management, restaurant point-of-sale, kiosk and mobile ordering as well as operational support, driver logistics, and analytics. Crave Technology can also be licensed by national and regional restaurant groups looking for an opportunity to scale.Unlike other cloud operations, Crave does not partner with third-party delivery companies and instead employs its own staff to undertake delivery. The company also employs a large crew of mobile servers to engage with customers during pick-up, as well as customer service reps who answer phone calls. Crave conducts regular surveys on menu preferences and pricing, adjusting recipes and approaches in line with customer insights.In July 2021, the company estimated that its Boise location was generating USD 500,000 in monthly revenues.Since 2019, the company has received 4 rounds of funding amounting to USD 16.5 million. The latest round was in July 2021 when the company raised USD 3.3 million in seed funding. Prior to that, in March 2021, the company raised USD 4.9 million in a seed round led by early-stage investment fund StageDotO Ventures. Crave has leveraged these infusions for the expansion of its cloud kitchen operations and its licensing initiative for Crave Technology.

Crave Hospitality Group

Kitchen Republic is an Amsterdam-based cloud kitchen provider that offers food and drink entrepreneurs dedicated production spaces and access to high-quality equipment, alongside dedicated refrigeration and storage space. As of February 2022, there were 90 unique food brands listed as Kitchen Republic members, including Sauer Crowd, Vagabond, The Food Ninja, and Cultcha Kombucha.Compared to other cloud kitchen platforms, Kitchen Republic does not have a central location with easy access to large urban populations. This has effectively prevented partnerships with third-party delivery platforms like UberEats and Deliveroo. Instead, the company’s location in Amsterdam West is more suited to restaurateurs with their own delivery platform.

Kitchen Republic

Kitchen infrastructure companies that provide purpose-built commercial kitchens as a turnkey expansion solution and also manage end-to-end operations on behalf of restaurateurs and food entrepreneurs (e.g. recipe-based food preparation, staffing and day-to-day kitchen management).

Players in this segment focus on creating virtual restaurant concepts or digital food brands, usually chef-created or celebrity-inspired, for licensing or franchising by third-party kitchens. These companies do not usually have their own kitchen facilities but partner with restaurant franchisees that prepare the meals using underutilized space in their existing kitchens.

Players in this segment are companies that wholly own and prepare several delivery-only food brands. Meals are either prepared in an independently-owned kitchen facility or through underutilized third-party kitchens using the cloud kitchen’s own staff. These food brands are not available for licensing or franchising by third-party kitchens.

Kitchen infrastructure companies that offer restaurateurs and food entrepreneurs purpose-built commercial kitchens (both private and shared spaces) as a turnkey expansion solution.

Some companies provide B2B SaaS solutions for restaurants to manage their cloud kitchen orders

Epic Kitchens

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