Mellow Mushroom takes “unique” to a whole new level — from the way it bakes its pizza to its free, anti-corporate culture and hippy-inspired store design and decor.
By Katie Lee
When you think of a typical pizza chain, Mellow Mushroom isn’t likely to come to mind. But the 181-unit, Atlanta-based franchise is cool with that. That’s because the laid-back group, famous for their unique Southern-style pizza with a savory, hippy twist, is the ‘anti-chain’ chain. Each location is entirely unique — so much so that some patrons can’t believe it’s a chain. All but two restaurants are individually owned and operated, with generous latitude in how the stores are designed and decorated. So if you’re looking for a cookie-cutter corporate culture, you certainly won’t find it here.
Unique Built Environment
“The built environment is completely different in every location,” says Annica Kreider, Mellow Mushroom’s vice president of brand development. “It’s a much more difficult way to get a restaurant open that just the typical cookie-cutter — everyone has this booth, this is the fabric, this is the wall color and this picture hangs on this wall this high up. It’s a dramatically different model, but we feel like it’s, among other things, one of the big contributors to our success.”
Restaurant franchisees are involved in the creative process from the start when it comes to designing and decorating their restaurant, from selecting local artwork to repurposing interesting objects that give each location its own look and flair. Only 15 to 20 new openings typically come online each year, partly because the process of creating a unique built environment for each and every store requires substantially more time and creativity than building the same cookie-cutter box over and over.
“We have a very unique model for store design, so 15 to 20 is our sweet spot that we can really open effectively — manage the opening and support the opening the way we would want to without dramatically changing our corporate headcount structure,” explains Kreider.
In 2015, Mellow Mushroom opened 16 new locations and plans 18 more in 2016. At present, the Atlanta-based chain is located primarily in the Southeast but also has a smattering of non-Southern locations in Denver; Salt Lake City; Lincoln, Nebraska; and more. Later this year, Mellow Mushroom will open its first restaurant in St. Louis. In August, restaurants are planned to open for the first time in New Jersey and Maryland.
The average square footage of a Mellow Mushroom restaurant is 5,500 — but that’s just an average. Once the basic criteria are met — such as every restaurant must have an open kitchen, a full bar, a certain percentage of seats with a view of the kitchen, etc. — the rest of the store design is relatively open.
“It certainly has a non-franchise look,” says Kreider. “We refer to ourselves as a ‘collection.’ We like to say, ‘If you’ve been to one Mellow…you’ve been to one Mellow.’ When people travel, they like to visit different ones. The food’s the same, but the environment may be completely different.”
Mellow Mushroom comes by its independent spirit honestly. The company was founded in 1974 by three college students, two of whom were attending the Georgia Institute of Technology, who insisted they could not find a decent slice of pizza in all of Atlanta — so they created it themselves. Mellow Mushroom’s first location was a tiny space near Georgia Tech that had been converted from an old liquor store. Soon enough, lines formed out the door and down the street for this new “damn good pizza.”
Uncompromising Quality & Relevancy in a Modern World
What makes it so good? One unique factor is the pizza is always stone-baked. “We use a stone oven and, in today’s world, we’ve held on to that. There are obviously a lot of conveyors and other oven systems now, but the stone baking is one thing that’s really critical to our product,” says Kreider. Also crucial to the mix is Mellow’s signature dough and proprietary sauce recipe. The dough, the sauce and the oven have stayed the same since 1974.
Approaching 42 years old, the chain is naturally going to show some age — but somehow Mellow manages never to look dated except in a groovy, retro kind of way that is entirely intentional. Even so, approximately every 10 years, each restaurant undergoes a scheduled refresh. Six refreshes are currently in the works.
“It’s a pipeline that’s always continually rolling forward,” says Kreider. “We go in and redo the consumer-facing environment: change some of the artwork, maybe change some of the fixtures and finishes. On the kitchen side, if there’s equipment that needs to upgrade, all of that gets done as well. Just to make sure the older units are brought up to brand specifications and reflect the same kind of core values as a new store.”
Staying hip and relevant is something Mellow Mushroom pulls off with apparent ease, but a lot of work goes on behind the scenes to make it appear effortless. “We work very hard to make sure that we’re staying on top of consumer evolution of tastes and trends and things like that, while we also don’t want to throw out what got us here,” says Kreider. “We want to be relevant both in a custom built environment and also from a culinary standpoint. We don’t buy the cheapest products we can get — many times, we buy the most expensive and that’s really important to us. We feel like uncompromising quality is incredibly important. We’re never, ever willing to compromise quality, and we think that’s apparent to our customer.”
Currently, Mellow Mushroom is conducting facility-related consumer surveys, which is something it does on a regular basis. “We’re doing some consumer studies to really understand our facilities and how our guests use them and what’s important to our guests,” says Kreider. “We want to make sure that we’re delivering, whether it’s related to their experience at the bar, their experience in the store, the comfort of the store, the design, the décor. We want to make sure we understand what the consumer wants to see from us. It’s really important to us that we maintain relevancy with the consumer and also that we maintain our uniqueness. We feel that we’re a brand that fits very different. We like to do things in a different way that maybe other multi-unit restaurants don’t do. It’s really important to us that we hold on to that. We’re not looking to become cookie-cutter at all. We want to continue to push the envelope, to be viewed as a unique destination with great food and a great bar. Maintain the heritage things that got us there, but making sure that we’re maintaining relevancy in a modern world.”
Conceived in the free-spirited ‘70s, Mellow Mushroom gives off a cool, artsy, hipster vibe — something the company has been doing since 1974 and continues to this day, even in the face of the restaurant industry’s vastly changing pizza segment.
“Although pizza is a traditional product, the pizza segment is really growing,” says Kreider. “I think a lot of that is being carried by fast-casual. You’re seeing those pop up, and I think it’s a natural evolution of product and evolution of the restaurant industry. I think that’s good.”
But don’t expect Mellow Mushroom to ditch its full-service bar and dining experience for a Subway-esque case of toppings and ingredients that allows you to make your own pizza in 5 minutes or less as you move down the line. Mellow Mushroom not only puts a premium on quality, but on experience.
“We feel like a lot of what we deliver — both in the food and in our beverage and bar experience — is highly experiential,” explains Kreider. “People are coming in when they want a little bit of respite from the world. They want to have a craft beer or a craft cocktail and a really great pizza. It’s a little bit different than, like you say, Subway, that sort of very fast experience. It’s a different need state.”
Maintenance & Environmental
As might be expected given the freedom allowed its franchisees, Mellow Mushroom handles repair and maintenance from an individual store owner standpoint. “They are responsible for it at their own level,” says Kreider. “We have a large group of operational business coaches [who are] in the stores on a very regular basis. When they make a visit, they have a system that allows them to generate a report, so if there’s any facility maintenance that needs to be addressed, they’ll note that during their visit and then the owner is responsible for handling that themselves.”
Ecolab is an example of a national provider hired by Mellow Mushroom because, with its national scope, Mellow can achieve a more advantageous price for Ecolab’s products. But in other cases, individual franchise owners have their own local arrangements with a provider or with whomever did their original construction.
“Some vendors were [hired] based on their ability to service our entire system,” says Kreider. “Some [franchisees] have a preferred local provider, and that’s fine too as long as they can get the work done. We give a pretty good degree of latitude to our franchisees.”
— This article originally appeared as the cover story of the April 2016 issue of Retail & Restaurant Facility Business. Email the editor at [email protected].