Oliver Kremer: Mission Tacos in New York City

Episode Summary Listening to Oliver Kremer of Dos Toros Taqueria illustrate the beauty of the burrito, it is easy to understand how he and his brother, Leo, found success bringing Mission-style Mexican food from San Francisco to New York.  Oliver and Syd discuss the ingredients that came together to launch Dos Toros and how Oliver, Leo, and Dos Toros have grown and changed along the journey, in this episode of The Sydcast. Syd Finkelstein Syd Finkelstein is the Steven Roth Professor of Management at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College.  He holds a Master’s degree from the London School of Economics and a Ph.D. from Columbia University. Professor Finkelstein has published 25 books and 90 articles, including the bestsellers Why Smart Executives Fail and Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent, which LinkedIn Chairman Reid Hoffman calls the “leadership guide for the Networked Age.”  He is also a Fellow of the Academy of Management, a consultant and speaker to leading companies around the world, and a top 25 on the Global Thinkers 50 list of top management gurus.  Professor Finkelstein’s research and consulting work often relies on in-depth and personal interviews with hundreds of people, an experience that led him to create and host his own podcast, The Sydcast, to uncover and share the stories of all sorts of fascinating people in business, sports, entertainment, politics, academia, and everyday life.    Oliver Kremer Oliver Kremer, co-founder and co-CEO of Dos Toros Taqueria, grew up in Berkeley, California.  He graduated from Washington University in St. Louis in 2008, where he flexed his entrepreneurial muscles in the business world, starting a website devoted to helping students find off-campus housing.  After graduating with a degree in finance he ultimately decided to return to his first love – burritos – and build a business with his brother Leo.  They opened the first Dos Toros Taqueria in New York City in 2009.  Today, Dos Toros has 22 locations in NYC and Chicago. In January of 2020 Dos Toros was acquired by Chopt Salad and L Catterton to form Founders Table Restaurant Group with the mission to create, acquire, and cultivate innovative and profitable founder-led restaurant companies. Insights from this episode:Details on the history of the Mission-style burrito and its signature ingredients, how that contributed to the launch of Dos Toros Taqueria, and what it was like to open their first location in Manhattan.How to predict demand by monitoring how outside factors, like days of the week, can affect consumer spending and how consumer psychology plays into that demand as well.Strategies for using technology to track consumer demand and whether you need high-end or basic programs.The secret formula, V.O.R.B (Value Over Replacement Burrito), that Dos Toros Taqueria uses to determine factors like potential new locations.Benefits of having a busy restaurant including reducing variability in sales and inventory management and how location affects your volume. Details on how Dos Toros went from one location to over a dozen, how they are handling COVID-19, their new merger, and what Oliver has learned along the way.  Quotes from the show:On the recipes that make a burrito: “If you can nail each one of these components and if you can portion them and place them into the burrito with real care and love that you can create a real synergy that is so much more than each one of these recipes by itself.” – Oscar KremerOn burritos in New York: “You can find amazing tacos that are really authentic, really high-quality tacos but the burrito was, seemingly, more elusive.” – Oscar Kremer“I love the creation of anything and food happens to be a pretty good anything.”  – Syd FinkelsteinOn product demand: “Thankfully, demand is remarkably predictable.  I think people outside of the industry don’t realize the extent to which you can forecast.” – Oscar KremerOn not overthinking your market: “Really we’re all very similar, I think, and if you use yourself as a North Star and as a good guide for what people want and when they want it, you’ll probably be fairly accurate.” – Oscar KremerOn starting Dos Toros: “We are expert connoisseurs and consumers of the burrito so we didn’t have a lot of questions about what we wanted this thing to look like or be like, it was just about execution.” – Oscar Kremer“I know it’s cliche but I really can’t overstate how important location is especially for fast-casual [food].” – Oscar Kremer“With every problem I come to, just really try to distill it down to its core and understand what the root cause of something is.” – Oscar KremerOn the importance of luck in business: “Acknowledging that is important.  I think it keeps all of us a little more centered on the reality of the world.” – Syd Finkelstein“I’ve done a fair bit of research on experience and whether it’s valuable or not valuable, in particular highlighting how so many of us, it’s human nature, reach all kinds of conclusions based on a sample size of one.” – Syd Finkelstein Stay Connected:   Syd Finkelstein Website: http://thesydcast.com LinkedIn: Sydney Finkelstein Twitter: @sydfinkelstein Facebook: The Sydcast Instagram: The Sydcast   Oliver Kremer LinkedIn: Oliver Kremer Facebook: Oliver Kremer Instagram: @guackaflockaflame Subscribe to our podcast + download each episode on Stitcher, iTunes, and Spotify. This episode was produced and managed by  Podcast Laundry (www.podcastlaundry.com)