Meet The Disruptors: Rishi Nigam Of Franklin Junction On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry
An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
Have Empathy — I was a manager for hundreds of employees while still in college; some were the age of my grandparents, so it was imperative to my success to manage people over profits.
As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Rishi Nigam.
Rishi Nigam is a Georgia native with over 20 years of diverse hospitality industry executive experience in restaurants, sports and entertainment venues, and airports. He is the CEO and co-founder of Franklin Junction, a disruptive restaurant e-commerce platform known for pioneering the Host Kitchen® model, which allows any kitchen to optimize excess capacity in existing infrastructure by becoming a fulfillment partner for proven restaurant brands looking for rapid growth in new markets. This untapped intersection of scale and pent-up demand for content unlocks new revenue streams for hosts while presenting an unrivaled capital-free expansion opportunity for brands.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?
My roots as a Southerner and the son of Indian immigrants merged with food as a central theme to the fusion of the two cultures. I began cooking professionally in college to “pay the bills” and never looked back.
After graduation with a degree in hospitality and tourism management, I had an opportunity to embark on a career path in a non-traditional vertical: sports and entertainment venues. After 8 years overseeing MLB, NFL, NBA, and other live event venues, I had the pleasure and immense challenge of rebuilding the venue experience at motorsports facilities as a vice president with NASCAR. Following my career in sports, I spent a few years as a partner in an airport concessions business where we turned around a legacy company and expanded to new major markets with innovative experiences and concepts.
This deep experience in high volume environments set the stage for understanding how to optimize kitchen capacity which became fundamental to our keys to success with Franklin Junction. With the adoption of food delivery, which was thrust forward several years during the pandemic, restaurants needed to evolve quickly to answer the rising consumer demand. Franklin Junction was borne out of a mission to not just help restaurants survive but thrive in meeting diners where they are with what they want and when they want it.
Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?
At Franklin Junction we unlock revenues for existing restaurants without any capital expenditure requirements. Restaurants, hotels, grocery stores, and any other professional kitchen can apply to join our network by becoming a Host Kitchen®, or fulfillment center, for other brands. We evaluate and accept only the most qualified operators for a controlled growth that focuses on food quality, employee training, and long-term profitability.
On the other end of the spectrum, we have proven restaurant brands who desire access to a new stream of customers by existing solely as a virtual restaurant whereby orders are prepared by hosts; we call these Cloud Concepts®. Both partners, the hosts and the concept, experience high margin growth with added risk mitigation to their existing revenue strategy.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
Well, it probably does not qualify as funny, but what was eye opening for me was going through the fundraising process with traditional venture capital investors. Almost every single one we spoke to tried to attach Franklin Junction’s metrics to targets that are incompatible with how restaurants adapt technology, evolve business strategy, and grow. We were fortunate to find the right matches that believed in our team, our mission, and the industry that we serve.
The lesson I learned is that you work with investors, not for them. It’s important to have lots of conversations, surround yourself with trusted advisors, and be an expert in your industry. There are many ways of raising funds and it’s one of the most important jobs of a CEO to identify the best fit for their company’s growth.
We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?
I have come across a lot of great professional coaches, but undoubtedly, I have been fortunate to have the best lifelong mentors within my own family.
My parents, first and foremost, always provided the push for me to be well-rounded, helped me see opportunities where I was not able to, and showed me how to have the grit to turn my dreams into a reality. Growing up, I was also exceptionally close to my grandparents. They taught me how to lift others by being a good citizen and a servant leader through empathy, unconditional love, and by teaching me charity doesn’t require large sums of money.
I am the first person on either side of my family to be born in this great country. The selfless sacrifices I have seen my family make for future generations have instilled morals, values, and ethics that have shaped my character on which I rely as a compass for decision-making every day.
In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?
Disruptive innovation can be good if it’s not distracting or done out of vanity. Disruption is created by creating a product or service that appeals to a neglected segment of customers or by creating a new market.
One of my favorite examples of positive disruption is Airbnb. They created a platform for people to monetize excess capacity in their homes by offering a better price, personalized service, and more flexibility than legacy hotel companies offer. Franklin Junction has been called the Airbnb for restaurants which is a very flattering comparison and shows the opportunity we provide to restaurants.
Another favorite of mine is Napster. Talk about upending an industry! Some of my favorites (vulnerability) that missed the mark are Sony Betamax (compatibility, expense), New Coke (quality, authenticity, demand), and Google Glass (privacy). All these companies have been and still are product leaders in their industry, but they were not afraid to fail along the way. Disruption is a process!
Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.
Have Empathy — I was a manager for hundreds of employees while still in college; some were the age of my grandparents, so it was imperative to my success to manage people over profits.
Stay Informed — One of my favorite philosophers is Socrates and I employ Socratic questioning to gather the necessary facts needed for making critical decisions leading to the best potential outcomes.
Talk Less — As I started to rise in the ranks, I learned to hire the best talent at any cost and trust them to solve business problems without my interference, which directly contributes to their development and preserves my resources where they are needed most.
Be Accountable — When I was completing my MBA, I received the guidance multiple times from my professors that I am a natural leader and that the trait calls for responsibility and accountability, not ego.
Laser Focus — I have fought the urge to be a multi-tasker and am completely obsessed with doing one thing as close to perfect as possible at a time.
We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?
We are innovating in a highly competitive environment right now and will have exciting announcements to share in the future. I would tell you to keep an eye out for more integrated consumer experience that is more relational than transactional. You will also see us expand more into international markets soon which is very exciting for us and our brand partners.
Another interesting development for us is how we have diversified outside of restaurants to other kitchen facilities. In the past year, we have launched in groceries, hotels, and family entertainment centers. It’s been extremely well-received, and we continue to grow into new verticals every year!
Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?
I’m a voracious reader and a polymath so I love reading reference books. When I was young, I would go to the library and check out random books from encyclopedias and read them cover to cover. Obviously, I cannot retain a substantial amount of that information; however, it was fun and still is my favorite section in the library. This was highly impactful because it taught me to seek the “why” and “how” for an answer to a question.
Today, people can enter any question into a search engine and receive an answer instantly and immediately give it the credence it may or may not deserve. However, when we don’t know why it’s the answer or how we got to the answer, we lose the logic that can only be gleaned through rational arguments. I am a big proponent of being able to “explain your answer”.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
I’m the biggest Elvis Presley fan you’ll ever meet. When I was young, I read a quote from him that sticks with me every day, “Don’t criticize what you don’t understand, son. You never walked in that man’s shoes.” It may be human nature to pass judgement but restraint to act without knowledge of a person or a situation takes an elevated mindset which requires deep practice.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
I am concerned about the growing rate of declining mental health among people. There are three areas of focus that I believe contribute to a positive state of mental health for me and I would encourage others to spend more time incorporating them into their daily routine.
The first is dedicating time to be actively disconnected from technology, especially if you spend a lot of time on social media, which I find to be obnoxiously toxic for the most part. Replace this time with genuine human interactions through meetings, conversations, or activities.
The second is by incorporating physical exercise and a healthy diet. These are two things that are really about a way of life than an event. Even if you can’t get to the gym or play sports regularly, an hour or two of daily walking goes a long way.
The third is spending time on resetting your mind. I tend to hyper focus on whatever I am doing so I use various mediums to clear my mind and restore my alignment. Some tactics that work for me include meditating, reading, or listening to music.
I have a higher stamina than most people I know in both, my professional and personal life. These three areas of my lifestyle have allowed me to recharge and maintain clarity in thought. Please take care of yourselves!
How can our readers follow you online?
Be sure to follow me and Franklin Junction on LinkedIn as we post exciting new content every week!
https://www.linkedin.com/in/rnigam/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/64866191
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!
Meet The Disruptors: Rishi Nigam Of Franklin Junction On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
