In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen - RBI CEO and Chair: Burger King, coffee, speed and trust

Episode Date: March 20, 2024

 Today’s guests; Patrick Doyle and Josh Kobza, the Executive Chair and CEO of Restaurant Brands International, one of the world’s largest fast-food companies. They own Burger King, Tim Hortons, Firehouse, and Popeyes. In other words, they sell billions of Burgers, Coffees, Chickens and Sandwiches every year. They discuss trends in the industry, how they work together, the link between trust and speed, and much more.The production team on this episode were PLAN-B's Pål Huuse and Niklas Figenschau Johansen. Background research was done by Sigurd Brekke, with input from portfolio manager Irene Jensen.Links:Watch the episode on YouTube: Norges Bank Investment Management - YouTubeWant to learn more about the fund? The fund | Norges Bank Investment Management (nbim.no)Follow Nicolai Tangen on LinkedIn: Nicolai Tangen | LinkedInFollow NBIM on LinkedIn: Norges Bank Investment Management: Administrator for bedriftsside | LinkedInFollow NBIM on Instagram: Explore Norges Bank Investment Management on Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

So, hi everyone, and welcome to In Good Company. I'm Nikolaj Tangen, and the CEO of the Norwegian So-And-Well Fund. And today, we are joined by Patrick Doyle and Josh Kobza, the executive chair and the CEO of Restaurant Brands. So basically, you get two for the price of one, like in a good fast food retail shop. They own Burger King, Team Hortons, Firehouse, and Popeye's. So basically, combined, they sell billions of burgers, coffees,

chicken sandwiches. Very, very interesting. So, hey, what's so good about the fast food industry? We love this industry. We think it's a great industry. You know, it's a very stable industry. People generally eat three times a day, 365 days a year. So it's a pretty consistent business to be in. And there are a bunch of really incredible global growth drivers. You have the formalization of the restaurant sector all around the world, especially in developing markets. That's a decades-long journey, and that drives a lot of structural growth for us. It's also a pretty good margin business. So our margin profile is something like 40% operating margins and it's pretty low capital intensity. So something like

10% of EBITDA goes into CapEx. So you put that all together. So cheap to make the shops and high margin. Yeah overall sounds like a good combination. Now you're in coffee, you're in burgers, chicken, sandwiches. Why are those particularly good sectors? They're the four biggest ones globally. So we have amazing brands in the four largest segments of quick service restaurants globally. Pretty good place to be. Yeah. Well, there is one thing here which is glaringly absent in my mind, which is pizza. Terrible category. Patrick, you were previously the CEO of Domino's Pizza.

So why have you not entered the pizza business with this company? We've got plenty to work on with the four categories we're in today. Russell's doing a terrific job at Domino's. And there is just enormous value that we can create through these four categories and four brands around the world today. So we need to prove that this is a business that makes sense, having this holding company, having these four brands together, that we can run them better than if they were independent and separate.

And we can prove that with four categories. We don't need to prove it with five. But when you compare, if you now contrast and compare pizza against burgers for instance, how does it stack up? What's the best business? Well, you know, look, I don't know that it's a question of a best business as a franchisor, because mostly your income is coming from collecting royalties from the franchisees. As an investor in the public company, in the franchisor, they're both terrific businesses. But ultimately, the health of the business comes down to the cash on cash returns for the franchisees. So the answer on what is the best business, it's the business

that gives the best returns to the franchisees. If they're getting a great return on their investment, they're gonna build more, they're gonna reinvest in their restaurants. So franchisees, they basically run the restaurants for you. They run the restaurants, they own it. It's their capital and it's their return. If they're getting a great return, then they're gonna build more of them

and that's gonna accelerate the overall growth of the brand. And because we're fundamentally, our earning stream is off the top line as a royalty, as a percentage of sales, our job is to create a great economic business and opportunity for those franchisees. And so as a franchisor, to me, the best business is the one that gives the best return to the franchisee and those that are most focused on that. And what are you seeing just now? I mean, you have inflation, which has been high. You have some economic challenges in many countries. What does the consumer behave like?

Overall, the business is doing pretty well, and we're seeing pretty good trends from consumers. If you look at our results last year, and especially in the fourth quarter, we actually saw a bunch of great things. In our biggest business in Timbs, we were positive in traffic. In our Burger King business, which we've been working to change the trajectory of, we're also positive in traffic for the first time in a while. So in a lot of our biggest business, we're actually seeing pretty good trends. Are you seeing any impact of the weight loss strikes? Nothing that we can see yet.

No. Do you think there will be? I think it's hard to say, but we really haven't seen anything that we can pick up on at this point. I mean, if you do the quick math, if 10% to 20% of people wind up on these drugs over time and they reduce their caloric intake by 10% or 20%, you're talking about a 1% to 4% overall reduction in calories consumed by people. And look, these drugs, for people who need them, it's wonderful. It's a fabulous thing. But if that happens over time, it's a negligible effect on the overall restaurant industry. What drives

the restaurant industry ultimately is the number of employed people. People who are employed value the convenience of food being prepared for them, meals being prepared for them, particularly if it's a two-income household. Just time value is high. And so the convenience of getting a meal prepared for you is, you know, is the value of that is terrific. And so, you know, what I always look at is, you know, tell me what employment levels look like in markets. And if overall employment is rising,

it's a very good sign for the restaurant industry. If you start seeing jobs getting cut, then that becomes a bit more of a concern. start seeing jobs getting cut, then that becomes a bit more of a concern. Okay, well, let's zoom in on Burger King. Now, we had the CEO of the other burger company on the show. How do you compare the two companies? Yeah, I think we're entirely focused on the Whopper, which is our flagship product. It's a huge brand in and of itself. Flame Grilling, which is our big functional differentiator.

We're the only large player that does Flame Grilling, and it generates a really differentiated taste that our guests love. And have it your way, which is something we started a long time ago, and we're bringing it back in even more modern variations. Reclaiming the flame or something. That's the big part of the plan. So we've been working on that. That is the big investment plan that we put together. We announced about $400 million a year and a half or so ago. And we're working on a lot of things, including modernizing all the facilities.

We think we need to have modern, convenient restaurants everywhere in America. And we fell behind on that. So now I have a big Macare and I have a double Whopper. Just how do you compare them as a professional? They're not comparable. The Whopper is much better. I don't know where to start. Well, I'm not surprised you say this.

But if you'd like scientifically, what is the difference there? So I think the biggest, scientifically, the Whopper is much bigger. That's our starting point. It's a large burger burger and you get more. But the other big differentiator is what I mentioned, is the flame grilling. And what does the flame do? It gives it more of a charbroiled taste that guests very much prefer over the flat top grilling. Now you kicked it off in the 50s, right? The Whopper?

Yeah, I think it was 1957 was the birthday of Whopper. Has it changed since then or is it the same thing? It's evolved a little bit, but not too much. It's pretty close to the original version. What do you guys eat? Whopper. Any particular type? Like double Whopper?

No, it's straight Whopper with cheese. Right. I'm a little bit more of a double cheeseburger guy. I have been since I was growing up. That's my favorite. Is it as good as it can be? Or are you working to improve it further? I think the biggest place that we can improve the Whopper is delivering on it more consistently every day, every time.

It is America's favorite burger, but we haven't always executed perfectly. And there's a lot of stuff that Tom Curtis, who runs the Burger Burger King business is doing to serve an even better Whopper every time. We're doing a lot more training to make sure we deliver the gold standard specification of the Whopper and we've also done a lot of investments in equipment. So we had some dated equipment in the restaurants and we put in tens of millions of dollars together with the franchisees to make sure that all of the equipment is up to spec and modern. That has a really big impact on the consistency that you get in everything from the toasting of the equipment is up to spec and modern. That has a really big impact on the consistency that you get

in everything from the toasting of the buns to the heat of the product that comes out. So we put a lot of focus on just making sure we're delivering that gold standard Whopper every time, every day. Now, Patrick, you were in charge of the big rehash of Domino's Pizza when you basically went out and said it's actually not very good, but now we are going to sort out something which is much better. Are you planning to do the same here? No, it's interesting. If you look at the four brands that we have, the one thing, and at some level, the only thing that

they have in common, other than all being restaurants, is they have the best in class food in each of their categories. Popeye's is the best chicken in the chicken category, just absolutely no question. The Whopper is the best product in the burger category. You go through all of them. Tim's has remarkable coffee. And the same at Firehouse. It's the only one that's hot and heated. So the food is in great shape. Domino's was in a very different situation where what they were great at was service and delivery and value. And they executed quite consistently. Their problem was people didn't think the food was very good.

So very different circumstance. Here where we've got some opportunities, like with Burger King and frankly Speed of Service-wise on Popeyes, we've got to execute this great food at a higher level. So a lot of the opportunity for these brands is going to come from execution, service levels in the restaurants, making sure all of the restaurants look great. Some of the Burger King restaurants,

probably half of them in the US, far less of an issue outside the U.S. where most of the Burger Kings look great. But in the U.S., half of them really need to be remodeled. So it's more an execution issue here than a food issue. Right. Do you have a responsibility when it comes to people's health? Yeah, I think we do need to be very thoughtful about the ingredients that go into our food, how we prepare it, and the nutrition of it. And we've become much more conscious of those ingredients over time. Burger King was one of the first brands, actually, to go through all of its ingredients and take out all artificial colors, flavors.

We actually moved to a much cleaner ingredient list about four or five years ago. And so we have been thoughtful about that, and we're trying to also be much more transparent in terms of the nutritional values of the food. Well, you know, we live up in Norway, lots of fish, lower fish burgers. What's on your next menu plan? So if you go to the Burger Kings here in the US, which I highly encourage, we have a fiery fish, which is a spicier version of a fish sandwich that's out now for Lent. And I don't know about a chicken burger, but we actually have a couple

of great chicken products already. We have our original chicken sandwich, which has been a favorite for about 60 years. And we now have our Royal Crispy chicken sandwich. So there's a lot of chicken options, a couple of fish options, and encourage you to check them out. Plant-based has perhaps not taken off

the way we thought a few years ago. You know, It's interesting on that. In Europe, it has. So you're looking at a pretty high mix on plant-based now in Europe. We've got markets that are in the 20, 30% of sales are plant-based products now. What are the biggest plant-based countries? It's the further north you get in Europe, the more you've got plant-based. The further south, still less. So Germany, Scandinavia, generally the UK, you've got higher levels. You get down to Italy, France, somewhat lower. Greece, somewhat lower.

I think Austria is maybe the highest plant-based right now. But it's been much less of a driver of business in the US. It's a low single digit percentage of sales in the US, but adoption in Europe has actually been very strong. Moving on to Tim Hortons. Now, I think perhaps if you're not from Canada, it's difficult to understand what an institution it is, right? How important is Team Horton? It's incredibly important to our guests in Canada, and it's very important to us as well. I think it is one of the most special and most unique QSR brands anywhere in the world.

It's almost synonymous with the country. Our logo has some similarities to the Canadian flag, and I think Canadians view it as theirs, rightly so. And it's an incredible business for us. What's so good about it? You know, I think the coffee business overall is a great business. It's a very routine-based business. So a lot of our guests come to us every single day of the week, some multiple times a day.

So there's a lot of loyalty. And the beverage business is a good business, a high margin business. Well, it's an addiction business, right? It's a recurring business. This is my high margin business. It's an addiction business, right? It's a recurring business. I mean, this is my number four today. Great. That's perfect. It's legal, right?

I mean, if you stop drinking coffee, you get like headache. You get a headache. Three days. I mean, several days. Headache. Yeah. I have it every morning. I don't do three or four a day, but every morning pretty much.

But it's an amazing business. The product is terrific. People love it. And truly, I mean, I've spent half of my career outside of the US. There is no brand in its home market that is as beloved as Tim's is in Canada. It's remarkable. So how would you think about that then?

So it's kind of maxed out in terms of love, penetration, shopping patterns, all that kind of stuff. Where do you take it from there? Love, yes. Penetration, no. There are still more opportunities. Our business in the afternoon and evenings is growing very fast. We're moving more and more to cold beverage, which is a great driver of business. And then we've got the opportunity to take it around the world. And we're doing that now. So it's now growing outside of Canada, including into the US. And that's really what's going to drive growth on it. But there's still even opportunities in Canada. Canada is one of the faster growing populations amongst

developed countries in the world just because of the immigration policies. It's growing probably a percent and a half a year. So we should be growing our restaurant counts at least a percent and a half a year in Canada. So there are actually a lot of growth opportunities there. But it's our biggest business. From a cash flow standpoint for RBI, it's bigger than Burger King. It's the more you can do on the global coffee scene. Oh, absolutely. One of the reasons we got involved with the business is we think that the global coffee business is one of the most compelling opportunities out there and will be for decades to come. And I think to your point, many of the best restaurant companies, they have a geographic origin story.

Popeye's has the same. It brings a lot of its authority from coming from New Orleans and the Cajun cooking. And so the fact that Tim Hortons is closely tied with its origin, I think is a good thing. There's a strong point of view there and the business has a lot of authority in coffee. So I think it's a natural player in the global coffee markets. And there's so many exciting markets out there. You know, there's places like China, where you're just starting to see greater adoption of coffee. India is another one. I think those are two that have us the most excited. Kind of come visit the coffee beans that are being grown in Canada. They're pretty remarkable.

Right. Sorry, you're going in there. Doesn't exist. I had never heard about it, so it wasn't you on me. Now, there are some- In very southern Canada. Yeah, you do grow wine now in Ghana. Exactly. But there are some problems related to coffee production,

in particular in deforestation and child labor. How are you dealing with these? So we're very thoughtful about the sustainability of our coffee. We go back and verify the sustainability of it and look at things like farming practices and all the places that we buy from. So we're auditing for child labor. And I mean, we're doing everything we possibly can to make sure that we are as good at that as anybody.

Okay, moving on to corporate culture. Do these brands have separate corporate cultures? And in which case, what are they like? I think we have a unified corporate culture across all of the businesses. I think culture comes from the leaders and what they exemplify. For me, it's less about the value statements, the management systems. I think a lot of it comes from what we do. And that's what I've seen over all of my years in business.

I find that if we wear suits and ties, you end up seeing it in the restaurants. If we wear jeans and t-shirts, you'll find that too. And if we're kind with people, all of a sudden you'll find out over time that people at the restaurants are kinder to the customers. Are you kind with people? I try to be. He is. I promise. So I am just very conscious of the behaviors that we model as leaders. And I think that tends to find its way through your organization in a faster way than you think in a more powerful way than systems can drive. You employ a huge amount of young people. How

many people do you employ? So if you look across our system, including all the franchisees, the total employee count is probably somewhere north of 500,000 today. 500,000. So it's a tenth of the Norwegian population. Now, how do you think about how to treat these young people? In many cases, you would be the first meeting with a job, right? Yeah. It's a huge responsibility. It's a really important one. And many of us had some of our first jobs in restaurants. I don't know about you guys. I had my first job in a fried fish restaurant in Florida. So many people have their formative experience there. And I think young

people, they want to be proud of what they're selling. They want to have flexibility because they're probably trying to work around other things in their lives, whether that's school or another job or family commitments. And then we provide both those things. And I think the really important thing in my mind is the environment that we give people to work in. And that's one of the less discussed things about our efforts to update all of the Burger King US facilities. I think it's really critical if you want to be an employer today, a competitive employer, to give people a workplace that they're comfortable in and they're proud of. How do you make people proud of working in Burger King? I want them to have pride in the products and the quality of the products that they're serving. I want them to feel proud of the facility where they work at, where that's a nice-looking

facility that people feel good about. And I think the other important thing is the kindness and the relationship with the people who are running the restaurants. And a lot of that comes from the restaurant general manager. You always find when you walk into a restaurant and you have an amazing restaurant general manager, the restaurant just magically works better. You can tell people are happy. The environment in the kitchen is better. The interactions with the customers are different. And so I think that example that the restaurant general manager sets for young employees is really powerful. And a lot of that comes from our franchisees.

And how do you find these people? How do you interview for that type of soft skills? I think that's one of the discussions that we've had a lot recently is what's the right profile of franchisee? And I feel very strongly that the smaller franchisees who are involved in their communities, who are in the restaurants every day, they're the ones who tend to be the most successful because they care a lot about their people and people feel that. And I think that's probably the most profound thing that impacts the environment in a restaurant.

I'll tell you, Nikolai, to me, in the restaurants, the answer is always, and frankly, even in corporate level, you hire attitude, you teach skills. And so if somebody comes in and they want to work in your restaurant and they walk in and they look presentable, they show up on time for the interview, they're looking you in the eye when they're speaking to you and they're shaking your hand and they're saying, thank you for this opportunity. Perfect. You're done.

I'm going to hire that person. And a mistake that I've seen franchisees make, particularly when they're hiring managers, restaurant managers, is they'll look at the experience of that restaurant manager and the number of years they've been doing it. And they get very focused on that. And if that is not a kind person who is going to treat the people well, who work in that restaurant, I don't care what level of success they've had running restaurants before. I want the person who's going to come in and set a tone for that restaurant and for all of the young people who are working for them. Because for the vast majority of the people working in the restaurant, it is their first job.

They're going to remember that experience. Most of them are going to wind up getting promoted at some point to customer. They're going to go on and they're going to do something else. And their brand impression is going to be 100% built by the experience they had when they worked in a Burger King or a Popeyes or a Tim Hortons or a Firehouse. I think it's interesting. You know, we live in a world where there is more AI and more machines, more of these kind of things. But it will strike me more and more, you get into a restaurant, what makes you come back

is just the, I mean, it's the attention. It's the- Absolutely. It's the person seeing you. It's, you know, it's that connectivity. Now, how do you make sure that the people who work there have that every day? I mean, it's just like relentless, right? You can't skip a day. That's the franchisee, right? I mean, it's ultimately the tone that the franchisee, because we, with over half a million people working in our restaurants around the world, we can't be enforcing that. It's got to be something that is naturally set by the franchisee

that we have an expectation that the people we hire are going to be kind to our customers. And that's something you can't instill in somebody. If they walk in, you know, I always tell people that the interview you have with that person is the best they're ever going to be. So if they are not kind to you when they walk in, if they're not polite to the people behind the counter when they're asking for the manager, you know, who's going to interview them. I mean, look at all of those signs. If they show up and they're not looking kind of neat and smart and well-groomed,

that's the best they're ever going to be because the day they're asking for a job. And so if you hire those people who have a great attitude and it's natural for them, that's going to set the tone for everybody in the restaurant. So in the burger business, what's the people turn over there, for instance? So I think the key is the restaurant general manager. It's almost like it's in any business, right? What keeps people or causes people to leave is usually the manager. The manager is great at teaching people.

Like in all jobs. I mean, supposedly, you quit bosses, not companies. 70% of the cases, you quit the boss above you. That's right. So how does it range? So you've got a good shop and a bad shop. What's the difference in turnover between retention? Huge.

Yeah. Yeah, it varies a little bit by country, but you might have up to 200% turnover in the team members in a U.S. restaurant, in a restaurant that has a lot of turnover. And in a better one, you could be sub-100. Okay. So you keep them from between six months and one year? On average. I'd say it's six months and two years.

Yeah. Moving on to leadership. How do the two of you work together? Really well. Well, that's the way it looks. I think you are, I mean, you are both clearly very young and so on, but you are clearly, Patrick, you are clearly a bit less young. How old are you? I'm 60.

You're 60, and you are? 37. Okay. But on average, we're very averagely aged for leaders in a restaurant. If you take the average of the two of you. In our late 40s. What are the advantages of having somebody like Patrick

to draw on and learn from? There's so many. I just think in anything you're doing, I'm sure it's the case for you and your business, the ability to talk to somebody and have a sounding board, somebody you can talk through

some of the hardest problems that you have, who's in it with you, who understands the people, the context, the issues, who's lived it before. That is invaluable. So what's the most difficult thing he has helped you with? A lot of things. You know, I think he's taught me lessons about the importance of franchisee profitability and their success. It's been one of the biggest things that we focused on over the last year. And it's been really profound in terms of bringing everybody together and moving the franchisees forward. He's taught me a lot about being a better

communicator. It's something that I've had to work on a lot. I've learned a lot from Patrick on that front. And I think the ability to be relentlessly positive and motivating to people while still dealing with some of the hard issues. Well, how about the American, right? What has he taught you about communication? I think, one, just the importance of it, that you really need to get out there. This is a, you know, to the point you made earlier, there are so many stakeholders in this business. You need to be out there.

You've got to talk to people. You need to be really transparent. And that's something that we've evolved on a lot over the past year and a half, whether it's with investors, with our franchisees, with our employee base. I learned to become much more comfortable being very open about the good, the bad, what we're working on. And I think that's helped to bring people together more. And how open are you? I mean, in a way, you are the boss, right? You are the chair. How open can you be? Can you share the problems, all of them? Yeah, we do.

Right. Yeah, but look, Josh's the CEO. He is running the business, running the company. He's doing an amazing job. And it's interesting because you get into this role, and executive chair roles vary dramatically on what they're doing in the company. And what I've come to realize after we work through together and making sure we've got the right

team in place, we've got the right strategy, the right plan for executing it, it's all him now. Josh is the one that is driving all of that. What I find my job to be, I mean, day to day now, it's mentoring Josh, it's mentoring the five business unit presidents. But broadly, I think the thing that I now bring, and it's because I'm a little longer in years than Josh, is speed. He's right 99.5% of the time. He's a brilliant leader. He knows the right answer. But it's just that he's too slow. And well, it's not that he's too slow, but when you are earlier in your career,

you're still going to be working through the analytics on these things and saying, okay, my hypothesis is this. Let's test that. Let's look at the analytics. And with more years of doing this, often I think my job is simply to say, Josh, you're right. Just go. You're 100% right. Just go. Do you think it's the Harvard education, which is slowing him down? Do you think it's the Harvard education which is slowing him down? No, no. Too much analytics. I guarantee you he was one of the best students that ever went through there. He's an extraordinarily bright person. So you are more analytical, you are more intuitive?

No, it's funny because I'm originally way back when a finance guy. I'm pretty analytical. It's not that I'm more intuitive. At this point, it's just that- You've got more experience. I've just got more experience. So I've seen it before. And the answer is just go. Why is speed so important? It's how you create competitive advantage. And at the end of the day, I think one of the most important things that you look at in a franchisor-franchisee relationship that determines the success of both is the relationship and the level of trust that

you have between the franchisees and the franchisor. Because if the trust level is high, you move twice as fast. When that's broken, it just throws sand in the gears and everything moves slowly. And so when you're trying to change and adapt and improve the business for your customers, for your franchisees, what allows you to do that ultimately is that the franchisees look at you and say, look, he may be wrong, but I trust that he is doing that for the right reasons. That's very interesting because I'm very focused on speed, but I haven't really connected it with trust. Do you find that internally in the company as well, that the more trust you have,

the faster things go? Absolutely. Thousand percent. And how do you drive it? So, you know, look, ultimately it's about communications. It's about doing what you say you're going to do. It's about being very honest about what the real issues are and taking them on. I have this strong belief that you can walk into any company, even a business that you don't know, and you can just grab 10 people and say, if there is one thing that we could be better at in this company, what is it? And 80 or 90% of the people are going to wind up giving you some variation of the same answer.

And so then the question is, well, then why aren't you doing that? same answer. And so then the question is, well, then why aren't you doing that? And there's usually the answer is some version of how hard it is or how expensive it's going to be, or, you know, just how high that hill is that you need to take. And, you know, so I'll go back to the Domino's example. They, you know, the answer at Domino's was people didn't think our food was very good. It's like, okay, that's a problem in a food business. Let's fix it. Let's change that. And so, you know, working with Dave Brandon, then at the time he was CEO and we started the work. Russell was the chief marketing officer at the time. And then- Whose idea was it actually? You know, to fix the food, everybody knew it had to be done. Dave was the CEO at the time.

So Dave was ultimately the person that said, we need to do this. I was the president of the US business. So I wound up driving that. I hired Russell. And the process of fixing the food was underway when he arrived as CMO. But he's the one who oversaw the advertising. We walked out and just said, yeah, our food's not very good. If he hadn't worked, who would have been sacked?

Me. OK. Me. No question. Cool. Patrick, you've been climbing a few hills. And what makes you continue to climb? What is it that drives you these days?

I think joy in this world comes from doing things that you're good at. And I missed it when I left, you know, I left Domino's in 2018. And, you know, we had great leadership. It was time for me to pass the baton on to the next team. But what is it particularly which is fun? You know, it's fun figuring things out, seeing success. And at the end of the day, what's most gratifying for me is to see the success that other people are having because you're helping them to lead the business well. And, you know, at the end of the day, for me, really what drives me is the success of the franchisees. If the franchisees, I mean, most of my closest friends from my Domino's years, I'm very close to Russell, I'm very close to Dave, they both remain very, very good friends. But most of my closest friends from my Domino's years are franchisees. Is that what you eat when you hang out together as well? No, from the Domino's years now, they've got to eat Burger King and Popeye's.

And Josh, what is your driver? Who do you want to show? It's evolved over time. You know, when I was younger, I think it was what motivates a lot of young people. You want to be successful and see progress. And it's changed a bit. And today, I think it's much more, I would like to be proud over time of what we've done with these brands. And I'd like to change how consumers view them in a more positive way. As Patrick said, I want to see our franchisees be successful.

They're an incredibly important part of what we do. And I want to see their entrepreneurs all over the world. I want to see them win together with us. And I also want to see our employees do well. I want to see them progress and be successful and be successful for their families. So for me, it's moving the brands forward and seeing that success play out for all the people who are involved in the system. And which part of yourself are you trying to improve? So I think one thing I'd like to improve is using my phone less. I think it's something that distracts us.

That's just a habit. That's not the proper... More philosophically. More philosophically. I do think I'm trying to grow and learn as a leader. I'm learning a lot of things from Patrick in that respect. I'm early in that. Some of it's around communication. Some of it is about leadership

and trying to steer a very large organization. So it's something I'm continuing to work on. How do you relax? Pretty much anything to do with the ocean. So I love spearfishing, surfing, sailing, diving, sailing. Anything with the ocean is something that I just love, always have. When did that start? Shortly after I was born, I think.

And what about you, Perry? What do you realize? I'm actually the opposite. Mountains, skiing. Yeah, I love being in the mountains. That is my happy place. That's what causes my blood pressure to go down and the smile to grow on my face.

And, you know, I like playing golf and there are some other things, but I'm happiest in the mountains. Do you read? I do. What do you read? You know, mostly biography, a fair amount of business stuff. I'm reading right now a biography on Rudolf Diesel. Fascinating man.

What he invented in the diesel engine is extraordinary. And the story of how he died is one of the great mysteries. He disappeared right before the start of World War I. And his engine was the most efficient on the planet. It ultimately could decide who was going to win World War I. And he was taken off the map right at the start of World War I. So, Rudolf Diesel seems like he needs to get on my reading list. It's fascinating. And we've got tens of thousands of young people listening to this. What kind of advice would you give them? I would say work hard when you're young. I do think that's really important.

And I would make decisions about what you do and who you work with based on the people. Pick people you like, respect, and trust. And more often than not, it's going to work out for you. Well, you for sure have done great there. What about you, Patrick? What is your advice? So for me, it's interesting because a lot of people, they start their career and they say, I want to find something that I'm passionate about. And to my mind, I mean, you know, when I was 18 years old, I didn't think what I was going to be passionate about was leading restaurants. And what you find is that the passion builds because it's something you're good at. And you know that you can create value.

And so I think some people start out and they have the end in mind, and I need to find that perfect thing that I'm excited about. And what they don't realize is that, you know, I think the passion that you have for your job is because you grow more and more confident in your ability to do it well. And you want to show that and you want to prove it to yourself And you want to show that and you want to prove it to yourself and you want to prove it to your family and your friends that I'm very good at what I do. And I think people get very surprised to find that there are people who are passionate about accounting. There are people who are passionate about engineering. I mean, all of

these different disciplines that aren't maybe at the top of the mind of an 18-year-old or a 20-year-old on how they want to spend their lives. But they find out that it's extraordinarily rewarding to do something well. Well, you guys have done a lot of things really well. It's been great to have you on. Big thanks for taking the time. Thanks for having us. Thank you.