Muscle Maker Grill Now Offering Direct-to-Consumer Prepared Meal Plans

Direct to consumers sales is nothing new.  Look what Amazon did with that.  Now Muscle Maker Grill is extending its brand reach via direct to consumer with a focus on fresh prepared meals and meal plans. Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® stated “it’s about time a chain restaurant fill that space in order to drive new electricity in the brand.”

At the intersection of meal item subscriptions and menu development there is now a solution for the non-cook that wants to eat better food that can be tailored to their specific desires. Yes, once again our Grocerant Guru® is talking convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization as a branded meal invitation.

Muscle Maker announced the launch of www.MuscleMakerPrep.com. Now, customers can order ready-made “healthier for you” prepared meals shipped directly to their doorstep. So, the first location to launch this program is located in the Chelsea neighborhood of NYC allowing customers within 250 miles to order their ready-made meals. Additional sites are planned to come on-line throughout Q1 and Q2 increasing the company’s reach to consumers.

Direct t Consumers will allow Muscle Maker’s strategy to focus on non-traditional locations and ways to reach new consumers that can’t travel to a local store or don’t have one near them. The company believes the restaurant industry has changed and the team at Foodservice Solutions® has been saying that for years.

Being able to reach consumers through multiple touch points is critical to Muscle Maker’s strategy. Expanding grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared meal plans shipped directly to consumers doorsteps is a new way to get the company’s healthier products into the hands of consumers through contactless delivery and convenience.

This is a new evolving business line that expands the company’s reach to consumers and includes brick-and-mortar locations, non-traditional locations such as military bases and universities, home delivery through ghost kitchens and now meal plans shipped via UPS direct to consumers. This model can work out of all existing locations, including ghost kitchens and will be offered to sell through franchise locations.

Late last year the company announced a partnership with Happy Meal Prep and has been working relentlessly to perfect their temperature-controlled boxes to ensure safe delivery of MMG’s “healthier for you” food options. Partnerships matter when you are evolving your business model according to Johnson.

Muscle Maker customers can now order ready-made, prepared meals with options including Wraps, Bowls, Pastas and Salads. There are specific dietary categories as well including Keto and Gluten Free. After a minimum order of five meals, customers can order any quantity they desire to meet their meal prep needs. Customers can leverage customer relevant technology by opting in for texts or emails to keep up to date on the brand’s latest offerings.

Mike Roper, CEO of Muscle Maker Grill, stated, “MuscleMakerPrep.com not only creates an additional revenue stream for the company but allows for us to reach broader audiences and new market segments. This is an expansion of our strategy to get healthier food options to consumers via non-traditional locations and methods. As an expression of gratitude to our loyal customer base, for a limited time, the company will offer 15 percent off all first time delivered meal plan orders. As of today, we will be able to serve the NY, NJ, and PA markets and are seeking to open more markets as we dive into 2021.”

This partnership with Happy Meal Prep will drive new electricity, top-of-mind brand awareness, top-line-sales, bottom-line-profits, all while edifying brand relevance according to Johnson.

Johnson stated “that in my minds-eye the new electricity must be very efficient for the supply chain and includes such things as; corporate partnerships, fresh foods, online ordering, delivery, self-driving cars, plant-based foods, music, streaming, food sampling, toy’s, podcast, movies, cereal, developing brands, grocerant positioning, fresh food messaging, autonomous delivery, cashier-less retail, plates, glasses, cash-less payments, digital hand-held marketing.

All food and beverage retailers to survive the next generation of retail must embrace the artificial intelligence revolution while simultaneously embracing fresh food and beverages that are portable, fresh, with differentiation that is familiar not different and Subway fits that bill according to Johnson.

Don’t over reach. Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing ideations look more like yesterday than tomorrow? Interested in learning how Foodservice Solutions® can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit us on our social media sites by clicking the following links: Facebook,  LinkedIn, or Twitter 

Penny Wise 185 Million Pounds Sterling short Real Mex not so Real or Relevant

The popular definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.”  This sums the mind-set of many legacy chain restaurants operators today. (Guest Blogger Bill Cross)

The bankruptcy of Real Mex (whom the Grocerant Guru® and I offered to help years ago with their retail operation, and which my company tried to help a few years after that when I colleague came over there from another client) shows the bankruptcy of the restaurant and private equity way of thinking. Restaurants act as if the go-go-go 2000s are coming back, when consumers were eating out more than at home for the first time since records were being kept.

So that mind-set got Real Mex nearly $42 million in first lien debt, meaning it gets paid first in a bankruptcy, and $195 million in second lien debt most of which will never be paid back. I your company closing stores, are you reducing you menu, reducing your inventory, and reducing the number of managers in a store?  If so those are clues you might be on the same track as Real Mex.

Today’s food marketplace is so very different from then: EVERYONE sells food these days, and you can even get complete meals delivered to your home. Packaged foods have improved lightyears over the old TV dinners I grew up with, and better-for-you options are flooding the country. Yet many chain restaurants pretend they don’t need to compete, not just with other restaurants, and not even with other foodservice vendors, but EVERYONE. If you’re looking for success clues, that is one of them.

 What’s the answer? Don’t think about channels, or service, think about MEAL OCCASIONS. Consumers are hungry and aren’t asking themselves “should I eat fast casual, casual, fast food, white tablecloth or take out?” They don’t stand in supermarket aisles and ask themselves “do I want to buy this package of Tony Roma’s ribs or go to Tony Roma’s tonight and eat out?”

They are four different meal occasions. If you don’t get that, then you’re just repeating the same old (failing) mistakes expecting a different result. Don’t let you legacy restaurant brand practice brand protectionism of the 1980’s, 1900’s or 2000.  If you do your brand will look more like yesterday that today or tomorrow.

Looking A Customer Ahead drives top line sales and bottom line profits, year over year sales increases, and incremental customer counts.  Do you need outside eyes to drive inside results? If so contact:

Bill Cross is SVP of Business Development for Broad Street Licensing Group, the global leader in taking restaurant brands to retail. www.bslg.com or

Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® www.FoodserviceSolutions.us

Are you prepared to with the Battle for Share of Stomach or share of Dollars?