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Most founders start their restaurants in the red. Guy Allen did the opposite, turning a 12-seat sushi bar into a $3M business with lines out the door and plans for a $50M exit. He’s the founder proving restaurants can scale – if you treat them like startups.

Here’s what we talk about:

Leaving real estate tech after a decade to start over in food
Turning a sushi photography hobby into a six-figure uni import business
Why importing sea urchin taught him everything about supply chains
How Sendo became one of NYC’s busiest sushi spots – with zero marketing spend
The “three ingredients” behind every successful restaurant: food, location, brand
Why most chefs fail at business, and why one restaurant alone is a bad bet
The real margins of restaurants (and what “good” actually looks like)
How restaurant investing and profit-sharing actually work
The surprising scalability of sushi, and how he plans to reach 40 locations
Building publicly in an industry famous for secrecy

Cool Links:

Hampton https://www.joinhampton.com/
Lower Street https://www.lowerstreet.co/
Sendo https://www.sendo.nyc/

Sponsors:

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Chapters:

(00:43) The Sushi Business Model
(01:29) Guy’s Career Pivot from Real Estate Tech to Sushi
(03:46) Turning a Sushi Hobby into a Business
(06:27) The Economics and Challenges of Importing Uni
(11:28) Why Most Restaurants Fail and the Importance of Branding
(14:47) Financing and Structuring Restaurant Growth
(17:14) The Surprising Upsides of the Restaurant Business
(21:11) Ambitious Goals: Scaling to 40 Restaurants and a $50M Exit
(33:46) The Need for Transparency in the Restaurant Industry

This podcast is a ridiculous concept: high-net-worth people reveal their personal finances. Inspired by real conversations happening in the Hampton community.

Your Host: Harry Morton

Founder of Lower Street, a podcast production company helping brands launch and grow top-tier podcasts.
Co-parents a cow named Eliza.

40 Restaurants in 5 Years: The Blueprint Behind a $100M Sushi Empire

Moneywise