How This Vegas Restaurant CEO Built Crazy Pita

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Mehdi Zarhloul did not simply chase alternative. He constructed it into one thing lasting.

Lengthy earlier than Loopy Pita grew to become a multi-location model, earlier than ideas like Salad Insanity and Hen Genius launched and earlier than his firm went nationwide by way of crowdfunding, Zarhloul was only a 16-year-old child from Morocco chasing a dream in America.

He nonetheless remembers the primary time he noticed the Statue of Liberty.

“Once I got here to the nation and appeared on the Statue of Liberty, I knew I used to be a part of the American Dream,” he tells Restaurant Influencers host Shawn Walchef.

For Zarhloul, it was greater than a landmark. It was an emblem of all the pieces he believed was attainable in America.

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Zarhloul arrived from Morocco as a teen, able to work, prepared to be taught and decided to chase the dream that the statue stood for. His first cease? The restaurant business, a world he knew nothing about.

“The one factor I knew about eating places was you go and eat,” Zarhloul says.

He began on the backside, washing dishes in a small spot in Washington, D.C. He wasn’t good at it. Once they moved him to the kitchen, he hated that too. Bussing tables was worse. He broke extra glasses than he served.

However as an alternative of strolling away, Zarhloul caught round. Each failure taught him one thing. He discovered how a restaurant runs by doing each job badly — till he began doing them proper. Finally, the proprietor seen. Moderately than let him go, the proprietor handed him accountability. By 18, Zarhloul was managing the place. That first style of management gave him a way of function he had by no means felt earlier than.

Hospitality grew to become greater than a paycheck. It grew to become a ardour. Zarhloul threw himself into the enterprise, studying easy methods to lead groups, handle operations and join with prospects. His drive took him all the best way to 4 Seasons Lodges and Resorts, the place he rose to meals and beverage director. The job despatched him all over the world and immersed him within the highest ranges of world hospitality. Alongside the best way, mentors helped form his philosophy, particularly one who informed him, “If you’d like the silver platter, you need to go get it.”

Zarhloul took that recommendation severely. He determined that if alternative wasn’t coming to him, he was going to chase it down.

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Venturing out on his personal

In 2006, Zarhloul launched Loopy Pita, a fast-casual Mediterranean idea impressed by the flavors of his Moroccan heritage and the hospitality classes he picked up alongside the best way. It grew from a single Las Vegas store right into a four-location model, with three eating places across the Las Vegas Valley and one inside a Walmart. Alongside the best way, Zarhloul set the stage for franchising and expanded right into a rising client packaged items line.

He additionally spun off two digital ideas, Salad Insanity and Hen Genius, each designed to satisfy prospects the place they’re. From a worldwide pandemic to rising prices and shifting buyer habits, Zarhloul discovered to adapt with out dropping sight of what issues most: folks.

For him, tradition is all the pieces. Whether or not in tremendous eating or a fast-casual pita store, success comes all the way down to the connection between staff members and the company they serve. Tradition is not a buzzword. It’s the distinction between a buyer who stops by as soon as and one who retains coming again.

Zarhloul additionally believes in celebrating success, even when you need to create the celebration your self. That’s precisely what he did with Nationwide Pita Day and Nationwide Loopy Pita Day, which he based. These holidays are reminders to him that enterprise house owners want to acknowledge their wins. As he places it, if you happen to do not pat your self on the shoulder and cease and take a second, no person goes to do it for you.

That mindset helped push Loopy Pita to a serious milestone. Zarhloul expanded his firm nationwide by way of a crowdfunding marketing campaign. For him, it wasn’t only a enterprise transfer. It introduced him again to that first day in America, staring up on the Statue of Liberty and believing this nation might ship on its promise.

“The assets… are past my perception,” Zarhloul says. “You should use them if you know the way to function and if you know the way to grab them.”

From a youngster studying the ropes to a enterprise proprietor carving out his place in a aggressive business, Zarhloul’s story is about greater than chasing the American Dream. It’s about catching it and reminding the remainder of us that generally, the one permission you want is your personal.

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