Evonne Varady [00:00:00]:

We walk into this long conference table, and this colonel was sitting at the table and he's like, we have a problem. I was like, I thought we were in trouble. And he was like, we have 50 marines who are about ready to get discharged. He's like, they're overweight. He's like, do you think your meals can help us? And I was like, of course, you know. So again, if you're an entrepreneur, say yes and then figure out.

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Angelo Esposito [00:00:22]:

Figure it out.

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Evonne Varady [00:00:24]:

Throw your parachute. However.

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Angelo Esposito [00:00:28]:

Welcome to Wisking It All with your host, Angelo Esposito, co-founder of WISK.ai, a food and beverage intelligence platform. We're going to be interviewing hospitality professionals around the world to really understand how they do what they do. Welcome to another episode of Wisking It All. We are joined today by Evonne Varady, founder or co-founder at cleaneatz.com. That's Clean Eatz. E, A, T, Zed or Z, depending if you're canadian or american.com. Evonne, thank you for being here today.

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Evonne Varady [00:01:05]:

Thank you for inviting me.

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Angelo Esposito [00:01:07]:

Of course. I was super interested to kind of hear about your journey because I see that you guys are more than 85 locations. But before jumping into all that stuff, I love to maybe just get an overview of who is Evonne. How did you even get started in this space? And then hear a bit about, like, the inception of Clean Eatz.

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Evonne Varady [00:01:29]:

Yeah. So I kind of have a crazy story I started, I guess I always have had, like, a fitness, like, passion with me. And so I thought that I was going to go into physical therapy back in my high school years. I'm from a farm. I'm a farm kid. So my parents, they're in their seventies, still live on the farm, still raise their own beef, still. My mom uses a ringer wash machine. I don't know if you remember the ringer wash machines.

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Angelo Esposito [00:02:00]:

Tell me. Tell me what that is. Don't tell me.

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Evonne Varady [00:02:02]:

It's like the whole manual washing machines that you do the thing and then you have to hand put your things into the wringer and you have to wash tubs, so.

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Angelo Esposito [00:02:10]:

Got it, got it, got it.

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Evonne Varady [00:02:11]:

Hang them on the clothesline. Yeah. So my parents still. My mom still uses that because she doesn't believe in sometimes commercial washing machines can do the same job. So that's awesome. I mean, now looking back on things, like, I was like, we were poor, you know, so obviously we didn't. I didn't think about that as a kid, so I did. I look back and I always think that I was an entrepreneur because I gathered walnuts from our walnut trees and shucked them during the winter and sold walnuts and picked up cans in the ditches on my bike and did that.

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Evonne Varady [00:02:47]:

And I don't know if you guys know mushroom hunting, but, like, the legal mushrooms, like, that grow in the ground and would go mushroom hunting in the spring and sell them to people at the bar and stuff. So I look back on it now, and I was like, oh, that always was maybe on this path, but I was starting in health and fitness. I really wanted to be a Physical Therapy. And that was the year that they changed it to a five year master's degree. And so we went toward the school, and then when we sat down with the counselor and my mom got the bill of what it was going to cost for one semester, she was just like, hey, we can't do this. So she signed me up for x-ray school. So I became an x-ray tech, and I still kind of did, like, my little fitness stuff on the side. Long story short, I got melanoma by, like, just a fluke finding it.

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Evonne Varady [00:03:43]:

So they end up cutting the melanoma off the back of my leg. And six months later, I was with an ultrasound student who needed to scan, and I had some, like, lumps in my groin. So I was like, here, scan these. And they thought that that was lymphoma. So I was like, I gotta quit doing all these free scans. So I went into surgery. The physician or the surgeon there gave me, like, the three alt, like, three outcomes. Like, either you're a goner because this is lymphoma.

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Evonne Varady [00:04:14]:

We're going to take the lymph nodes out and you're going to be like, probably lymphedema in your legs, or you're going to be fine. And I was like, okay. So when I came out, I didn't see, like, I was expecting tubes in my legs and stuff, and there wasn't any, right? So every time I go, I'm a goner. And he came, he's like, I don't know what angels are on your side. He's like, but you, you are clear of everything. And I was like, okay. So he was like, you just got a second chance at life. You better go live it.

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Evonne Varady [00:04:42]:

And at the time, I was kind of doing a little bit of kickboxing, instructing on the side, and I had a group of women in my fitness class that they just could not lose weight. And so I sat them down one day and I was like, why can you not lose weight in a small town with a population of 600 people? We had a McDonald's on one corner and a hardee's on the other corner. As soon as they left my fitness classes, you know where they were? They were right through the drive thru. And so, I mean, I know it's cliche and all, but you just can't out exercise a bad diet, right? So I set them down in on a Saturday in the room. And I said at this time, I was kind of like meal prepping, which was back in 2006. So, yeah, no one even heard of meal planning companies back then. So I was like, hey, ladies, if I like, make your meals like I'm eating, would you guys do a six week program with me? And they're like, sure. So at the end of six weeks, all of my ladies had lost weight.

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Evonne Varady [00:05:40]:

And before I knew it, this redhead in town was meal prepping and training people at this local gym, which wasn't even a gym, it was our hospital, who we used their physical therapy department to train in. So that's how, like, it was just old school back then. So, yeah, so when I got all this second chance of life, I was like, man, I just really want this meal prep to take off. So I walked into my x-ray job and I quit. I ended up getting divorced because I was not happy. I had two daughters at the time. And I was like, what am I going to do? So my mom's like, do you have a theory? And I was like, I think I'm going to take this meal prepping business to like, and open a cafe. And she's like, okay.

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Evonne Varady [00:06:26]:

They all thought I was crazy. They're like, you left a pension, you left insurance, you left a steady income. Like, what are you thinking? And I was like, I don't know. And I think the best entrepreneurs are like, you're willing to leave everything behind and go pursue your future, you know, no plan B in the works. Always plan A. Yeah. And so that's kind of how we got. I met.

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Evonne Varady [00:06:49]:

I ended up getting a lease on this building, which I had no clue how to run a restaurant. I thought of a refrigerator before that.

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Angelo Esposito [00:06:57]:

I gotta ask you this, before that, you'd never worked at a restaurant.

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Evonne Varady [00:07:00]:

Just like, I was like a waitress at pizza man, you know, but nothing.

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Angelo Esposito [00:07:05]:

Little to no experience. I just like, I'm gonna open this. That's impressive. Just to jump in, right? Like, with both feet, cuz. Cuz you don't. Didn't have any experience. And so what did life look like then? You're like, okay. Mom's like, you're crazy.

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Angelo Esposito [00:07:17]:

Everyone's kind of like, what are you doing? So you kind of get this lease and what happens next?

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Evonne Varady [00:07:22]:

So I couldn't afford the lease and my home at the same time. So there was like a little closet in the back of this restaurant that wasn't a restaurant. I was converting a blockbuster into a restaurant. So it had nothing. And so there was a little closet in the back. And I was like, okay, this is where I'm living. So I made myself a little living quarters in the restaurant. I had positioned the restaurant right across from a gym, and I was like, okay, so I can sleep here.

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Evonne Varady [00:07:51]:

I have food because obviously, it's a cafe, and I can go across the street, work out and shower. And so that's what I did for two years. Back in the day. It was, I loved it. I mean, looking back, obviously it makes a great story now, but I really did love it because I have been in the divorce and I got to see the kids, like, it was obviously split custody, so when I didn't have them, like, what else to do but throw yourself into work? So. So it was great. So I was there 24/7 so it was awesome.

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Angelo Esposito [00:08:25]:

That's crazy. What a story. And let me, let me ask you this. At that time, was the name already Clean Eatz or was that something that developed later?

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Evonne Varady [00:08:32]:

No. So my six year old daughter came up with the name. It was called Low Cal Cafe, which was terrible because it looked like one. It made us think that no one was going to get full because we were such low calorie. Right. And then for the people who didn't understand the diet world and its low calorie, they thought it was a local cafe. So it was. It was a terrible move.

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Evonne Varady [00:08:55]:

And then I met my husband across the gym, and then he came on board when the housing market crashed. And then we moved out here to Wilmington, North Carolina.

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Angelo Esposito [00:09:07]:

Wow. And so I got access to early days. You kind of broke this cafe. What did operations look like back then? Right, so you're sleeping there, you're all in, you're cooking. How are you getting customers? I mean, obviously very smart that you moved in front of a gym. What were you doing? Because I'd love to hear, like, tactics in the early days. Right? Like doing what you got to do to, like, you know, how tactics evolve.

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Evonne Varady [00:09:28]:

But, yeah, no Facebook email had just started that then. So I was boots to the ground. I was old school, man. So I set up anything that had a gym, any event that we had, I was handing out the samples. I was at all the bodybuilding fitness things. I was knocking on doors. I was passing out flyers. So, like, it was back to the boots on the ground.

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Angelo Esposito [00:09:58]:

That's awesome. And at that time, were you. Was it mainly, like, people would come in and pick up or dine in, or was it all delivery too? Like, imagining in the early days, like, how you delivered? So, like, what did it look like back then?

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Evonne Varady [00:10:11]:

Yeah, no delivery, no doordash, none of that stuff. I was texting, remember flip phones? So I had started gathering phone numbers, like, cell phone numbers. And so I would text out our menu, you know, like a, b, c, you know, so it would take me all Sunday to do that. And then how I collected my orders was that they would text me back with what they wanted. So I always laugh and I'm like, it was the stick figure method, you.

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Angelo Esposito [00:10:39]:

Know, like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Evonne Varady [00:10:41]:

One, two, three.

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Angelo Esposito [00:10:43]:

Yeah, yeah. Especially, like, with the original cell phones where you had to click the key three times, you know, ABC def. Like, it was so long to write a sentence. That must. That must have been so painful to write a meal plan with those keyboards.

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Evonne Varady [00:10:55]:

And they only had a max of ten digits on there. So, you know, I had, like, at that point, like, 40 some people, so I had to send it out four. And there was no copy and paste back in the day. Yeah, it was.

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Angelo Esposito [00:11:06]:

Talk about the grind.

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Evonne Varady [00:11:07]:

The grind.

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Angelo Esposito [00:11:09]:

Wow. Okay. And so for people listening, obviously, I checked out Clean Eatz, and I know what it is. But for people who don't know what. What is Clean Eatz today? You know, how many locations do you guys have? I know, and we'll kind of backtrack. But, like, what does Clean Eatz look like today?

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Evonne Varady [00:11:25]:

So we are. As of today, we have 98 locations open. We have 87 in the pipeline. We're on track to usually open anywhere from 25 to 30 locations each year. That's how we kind of got it all stacked up. Yeah. So Clean Eatz. I know everyone is, like, tired of hearing this meal plan game, you know, the home or the blue apron and hello, fresh and that kind of stuff.

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Evonne Varady [00:11:53]:

So we are a brick and mortar. We look like a regular restaurant. You can walk in, order off the menu, fresh food, but our jam is usually these pre packaged meals. So we do six fresh meals each week, and then we have our grab and go section. We do our marketplace, which has really gotten into development here recently. And then, obviously, the traditional catering.

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Angelo Esposito [00:12:20]:

Wow. And right now, like, are you guys in certain geographical areas like that or Shanghai or pretty much across? I mean, based on your website, I saw quite a few states, but what do you see kind of going on? Do you see any trends in certain states where you guys are pretty heavy?

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Evonne Varady [00:12:36]:

We're really heavy east of the Mississippi because obviously when we first franchised there was just me and my husband and so we knew that we were like a three man team. So we made, we did a lot of, we filled out like North Carolina, first South Carolina, then Georgia, and then started going into Florida. And then in 20, let's say 20, I think it was, we hired brand one, who's our franchise developers, and we started going across that Mississippi over into the west coast area. So I think currently we're in 26 states right now. I might be 27, I might be off on that. But it's really when we get into a new state, usually our growth strategy is to try to get as like kind of like for brain awareness, for your distribution of your food and even your ops, you know, develop or just in your ops team out there. We try to kind of get it to where we at least have three or four cafes. Getting ready to open in that area.

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Angelo Esposito [00:13:42]:

Got it. And when you look at areas, just totally out of curiosity, do you guys still stick to what you did back in the day of trying to open near gyms or is that model kind of different now? What does that look like?

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Evonne Varady [00:13:53]:

It's always good because that's our, usually our like minded people are usually across the street from us in a gym. If not, then we try to kind of go around a military base or a university. We try to stay away from like those downtown populations. You kind of want to be in the area where people are coming back home because they usually pick up their meals on their way home. Hospitals are really great for us, but yeah, I mean, most, most of the time there's usually a gym around us at some like within 3 miles, so.

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Angelo Esposito [00:14:27]:

Right. That makes a ton of sense. And I'd love to hear because a lot of our listeners, right, they, they either own restaurants, manage some groups, some franchises, and so like, you know, pretty big jump from, you know, Low Cal cafe to Clean Eatz 97 or 98 locations. So that is a pretty, pretty big jump. So I'd love to hear, you know, just even share some kind of nuggets and learnings. Like what did the early days look like in terms of, hey, we got this one location grinding, doing what I got to do to make it work to then saying let's open a second or 3rd, 4th, whatever it is. Right.

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Evonne Varady [00:15:03]:

Yeah. So we had in the beginning, before we franchise, we had totally thought we were going to open a second location. And so when we went in to design our dream cafe, the guy behind the counter, he's like, you know, like, rumor has it through town, you all should be franchising. And we're like, we have no, we're gym rats. Like, I had no idea. I'm an x-ray tech, he's a carpenter. We just go to the gym to do that. We had no idea what franchising was, and so we started researching it a little bit, and we're like, yeah, you know, maybe we will do this.

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Evonne Varady [00:15:33]:

Because our mission has always been to impact as many people as possible. And we're like, we ain't gonna do this, you know? You know, by ourselves. We need an army of this. And so we end up franchising. And the guys who franchises are like, don't worry. Like, usually it takes like, six to eight months to sell a unit. So you guys are good. We'll work on operations, we'll do all this, and we're like, okay.

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Evonne Varady [00:15:54]:

And then six of our customers who were coming in our cafes decided to buy a franchise all at one time. So we really had to get, get everything in order fast. And if, you know, like, I don't know. I mean, people have strengths in operations. People have strength in creativity. And, like, I could, I could operate the cafe, but it was so hard for me to get everything out of my head onto paper and then make everyone understand what I was trying to talk about, you know? So that was a really big learning curve for us. We joke with the six owners who are still in our system, because I would send out text messages with, like, the new recipes for the week, your operation manual, you know, I mean, I'm, like, sitting here texting this. Like, I, we had no clue.

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Evonne Varady [00:16:39]:

Like, and thank God they were so, you know, forgiving with us and they worked with us and, and they all, like, one of them was a cable guy, you know, so he had no idea what franchising was. So all six of them had no idea what franchising even meant either. So we were all kind of learning together with this.

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Angelo Esposito [00:16:56]:

I mean, that's impressive because you're like a, that they started so early and that they're still around is already, you know, in the restaurant world in general. Like, you're lucky if you pass, like, year two kind of thing. So just that in itself is something. And the other thing that kind of caught my attention is usually at least on the more restaurant, restaurant side. It's like you need a couple locations to kind of prove out the numbers. And repeatability, and then, like, you know, there's the world then trying to franchise it. So, like, it's kind of crazy that you're able to do it with one. Which leads me to my question.

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Angelo Esposito [00:17:27]:

How good were the numbers? Let's say, in terms of, like, percentages, like, in terms of your, you know, bottom line and looking at, you know, your cost of goods sold and labor costs, like, were things that solid? Let's say at one location that it made it a no brainer for the other six? Or was it more like they believed in the vision and the numbers were a secondary kind of thing?

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Evonne Varady [00:17:49]:

Yeah, we didn't even do a P and L. Oh, my God. Like three years.

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Angelo Esposito [00:17:54]:

Okay.

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Evonne Varady [00:17:55]:

So when these guys came into franchises, that was the first p and l that we had ever done. I mean, obviously, we just. We would do, like, kind of at the end of the year, you know, like, with the.

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Angelo Esposito [00:18:04]:

Right, right.

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Evonne Varady [00:18:05]:

And he would be like, oh, yeah. You know, so we had. We. We were living our dream. And I know that sounds for everyone who's out there with number guys, like, I know that just makes you cringe, you know? But, like, we were just talking about this the other night because some of our owners are so, like, down to the penny, and I'm just like, is your bank account growing? And they're like, well, yeah. I'm like, that's all you gotta worry about, man. Like, we can, like, quit, like, dissecting every single ingredient. Like, it's.

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Evonne Varady [00:18:33]:

It's about the bigger picture here. And so we kind of laughed about yesterday. Cause I'm like, as long as we were, like, we had 20,000 in our account, and then we're like, okay, well, let's get 25. Let's get 30, you know? And so that's how we did our success. And, you know, at the end, like, that bank account was getting up to 80, and the tax bills started coming in a little bit higher because we were making more money. And. And so then when they franchise us, they deep dived into everything, you know? So that was kind of. Yeah.

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Evonne Varady [00:19:03]:

And I don't even know what the numbers were at that time. I'm like, the food girl. So my husband's like, the black and white, you know, number.

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Angelo Esposito [00:19:10]:

Yeah, nice.

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Evonne Varady [00:19:12]:

A lot of the ones that are still there. Like, one of our owners in Raleigh, North Carolina, I mean, he just built over $2 million home and moved in last week. So, yes, I think the number, you know, I don't want. But they must. Something must be working, so.

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Angelo Esposito [00:19:30]:

Right, right. And I guess, like, what were some lessons you learned? Right. Because obviously it's amazing to learn from your own lessons. Like, I've made so many mistakes in my business in the software hospitality space, and you're always learning, but it's also nice sometimes to learn from other people's mistakes, if you can. And so, you know, I'm sure you hit, you know, you learned a lot, as you mentioned probably, about, you know, sops and kind of documenting things. Once you were more than just a, you know, one man show, so to speak. What were some kind of hurdles you got from, like, you know, going to those initial, let's call it five locations, so then scaling to that next level, whether that's 15 or 20, like, what are some other hurdles that you kind of had to learn along the way?

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Evonne Varady [00:20:09]:

I would say the biggest thing and still to this day is communication. You know, it's. That's probably my weakest link, is communication. I think. I say I have a lot of conversations in my head which don't, like, project sometimes, too. I think that I have said that I haven't, you know, and it was consistency across the brand so that all of our meals look the same. That drove me crazy forever. And we really have a good, like, system right now.

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Evonne Varady [00:20:38]:

So I could pretty much say probably like 96% of all of our meals. Probably not. Probably. They taste the same, look the same, and all that just from the years of development, those recipes and the pictures, and I always use the peanut butter and jelly method. I don't know if you've ever heard that, where the kids are trying to make peanut butter and jelly with the dad and all the instructions are just crazy. So check that out. If you're having problems with communication in your systems operations, I would say another one is your man. You know, we all come in with egos and we think our way is the best.

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Evonne Varady [00:21:12]:

And I did it, you know, this is the way I've done it, and nothing wants to change. And that was a really big thing for me because obviously I'm redheaded and I do have the temper with the red hair. I was known for flipping some tables in the days, but that having owners and having them invest their money and being able to let your ego come down and listen to their suggestions because, you know, like, that's the only way you get better is taking feedback was a huge, huge thing.

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Angelo Esposito [00:21:46]:

That's, that's, that's crazy. And, you know, obviously WISK on the WISK side. Like we, we help mainly restaurants, but hotels, bars that kind of stuff, too, but really, with all the stuff they kind of hate, which is kind of like what you mentioned, like, I don't. I don't like those things. And for us, our kind of whole mission was like, man, so many people get into the hospitality space for a lot of different reasons, but, you know, the culinary experience or the guest experience, and then they kind of realizes there's all these other things they need to do. Like, oh, man, Excel and  P and L are like you mentioned, and, like, you know, my labor costs, my cost of goods sold in the market, like, so many. Like, and so we're like, okay, how can we help take some of that off their plate? And so I'd love to hear from you in scaling, I imagine. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I imagine you obviously probably had to start leaning in on some technology.

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Angelo Esposito [00:22:31]:

So I'd love to maybe, like, talk through maybe some of, like, your tech stack, like, you know, like, what were some of the important things in general when it came to technology and scaling, whether it could be marketing, it could be back. A house, front of house. Pos I'd love to hear just from your point of view, like, how did you see that evolution? What were things that made a real big difference from loan, you know, zero to 98 locations?

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Evonne Varady [00:22:54]:

Um, I would say the biggest part that, um. And we're kind of going through the transition, hopefully it's gonna be done within the next 30 days, was. Pos um, it was. And I'm not saying this to, like, but a lockdown pos system is, like, the best way to collect data. And we were using another one where they could just add in all their own buttons. They could, you know, make, like, every cafe probably had, like, there are, like, ten things that they made that weren't on our menu, or, you know, like. And then when they post it, you know, everyone else. So I would say the biggest piece would be to have a pos that you can collect the data and lock it down for your menu, pricing your recipes and all that.

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Evonne Varady [00:23:37]:

And then on the flip side of that comes we use restaurant 365 for your food inventory. We're kind of more complicated than other restaurants, only because we change our menu every week, and then we have our grab and go selections, which have over 300 recipes in them. So to really get those accurate food costs in there, you know, because an owner might say, I'm running 45% food cost, you know, and I was like, I've been to your restaurant, man. You got that back storage, and you have a lot of inventory. In there. So it was kind of good to see, you know, that made a huge thing because some of them hoard. Like, we have meal plan containers. I know I can name you six franchise owners right now that probably have a garage full of meal plan because at one point we ran out, you know, four years ago and so now they hoard, you know, a pallet.

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Evonne Varady [00:24:26]:

And I was like, so you have that? And so that was really good. As far as like, marketing, man, I feel like every time you figure this one out, it changes again. Right, right. We use Marvia, we support them with all the graphics. Again, our menu changes every week. So that's six new pictures that got to be uploaded, the meal plans, emails and all that. So that was a really good thing for us is that we could, with that the owners can go in there and grab their libraries and do that communication. I just said frame connect was a good one for that.

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Evonne Varady [00:25:01]:

That way we can all share the same post, you know, that gives them a platform to talk to each other on that we put tickets in because, you know, it's food. Nothing's perfect in this world. So they can put their tickets in, we can answer the ticket, we can collaborate with those tickets to see if this is a problem that keeps going, that we need to figure this one out. I would say those are probably try.

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Angelo Esposito [00:25:28]:

And think those are great. Yeah, yeah, it's great. It's great. And the POS, I think, I think that that probably will resonate with a lot of our audience because it's, you know, when you have one place, two places pick your preference. And I'll be honest, we integrate with 60 point of sale. So I hear the best and the worst of the same thing. So it's come to a point where it's like there's a lot of personal preference where someone will say, this POS is my favorite, and then someone else will be like, oh, that same POS is the worst POS I've ever used, you know, so really it's a preference. But to your point, once you do start scaling, we see like, there's less options because you do need that pos that can have like, the centralization and you want the POS items to be the same so you can analyze the data and not everyone to have different modifiers and different skus.

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Angelo Esposito [00:26:11]:

And then it's so hard. So that kind of stuff of being able to centralize and push and control pricing like, starts becoming quite important. So that makes a ton of sense. The back of the house, same thing. We're somewhat similar to restaurant 365. They're a little more on the accounting side, we're a little more on the operational side, but same type of thing, like back of house inventory ordering. I don't care what people use at the end of the day, but I just tell people it's important. Use something, because that stuff is hard.

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Angelo Esposito [00:26:38]:

Again, you can get away when you're in one location and you're kind of there all the time. Sure, you can figure it out on Excel, but at a certain point, Excel starts taking too much time because you're spending more time figuring out where the formula broke than getting the results you need. So there's that kind of, like, threshold of, like, Excel is good to a certain extent, you know, but it's funny. It's great to hear, like, your tech stack because I've been talking to more restaurants. I've been trying to bring it up more on the podcast just to kind of. It's. It's great just to hear how, like, restaurants and, and hospitality, you know, folks in general, just kind of adapting and, and leveraging. I'd love to hear.

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Angelo Esposito [00:27:14]:

What about on the delivery side? You guys do delivery? Are you just using the third party deliveries? Do you guys do online ordering? I'm assuming you do to somewhat. I'd love to hear about that side of things.

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Evonne Varady [00:27:24]:

We do online ordering. We don't personally deliver to anybody. I know there's a lot of companies out there, the meal plan game that does deliver. It is just a nightmare. We pilot programs with, like, three locations, and it was just. No one knows easy, but you got someone who doesn't use that door and they didn't get their meals, or the neighbor's dog ate the meals, or, you know, it was. It was a headache. We did it for almost a year, and I'm like, no, we're done.

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Evonne Varady [00:27:56]:

And then just the amount of stuff that you have to use with your refrigerated meals, like the ice packs, you don't think about the foam that goes in there, you know, so we do use, I think, all the third party deliveries, the doordash, the uber eats and that, you know, people we always like, joke. We're like, oh, we're a healthy concept. You guys should come through, you know, our doors, get out and get your steps. And, you know, we've kind of. But, yeah, it's convenient, so.

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Angelo Esposito [00:28:23]:

But it makes it. No, I'm just gonna say it makes sense. It makes sense because the truth is, like. And I think there's a lesson there. Like, sometimes you need to try things as an entrepreneur. Try things, and there's nothing wrong with failing, but, like, try, see, reiterate. Reiterate. And they're like, if it's not working, the cost doesn't make sense.

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Angelo Esposito [00:28:39]:

That, like, there's nothing wrong with, like, canning an idea. Right. And in your case, yeah. Like, it is a logistical nightmare. There's a reason, like, uber, I think, to this day, is, like, still not profitable. Like, it's hard. It's a hard problem to solve, and it's. I think there's a lesson there in terms of, like, sticking to what you're good at, not being scared to try new things, but also not letting your ego get in the way and saying, hey, this was kind of like, you know, we tried it.

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Angelo Esposito [00:29:06]:

It's not working. Let's go, you know, let's go back. Are there other things you can maybe share with our audience of things you've tried that, maybe you're like, huh? Not the result I was hoping for.

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Evonne Varady [00:29:16]:

Oh, yeah, there's. There's a whole list. I don't think we have enough time on this podcast. Yeah, the supply chain was another big one. You know, how do you get logo products every which way, you know, and we've gone through a couple of logistic nightmares with logo. Everyone loves logo products, but you like a lot of, if you're going from, like, 50 to 100, you know, I think that's great. I know that below that, you know, there's so much skus, there's so much money that's tied up into that. Then you have to pay the cost of someone to house it and deliver it, you know, and shipping costs have gone up sky high.

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Evonne Varady [00:29:55]:

So it's really just a break even on that. Try and think about what else. We've had numerous recipes, obviously, like, we got into the bar business about four years ago, and we're so excited about them. We had this big convention. We introduced these brand new bars that were, like, you know, packaged with our logos. And then about four weeks later, people opened them, and they were full of mold. Mold. I'm sorry.

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Evonne Varady [00:30:20]:

So vetting your distributors are your manufacturers is another huge lesson that we learned. I want to say to employees, like, that's always a lesson in itself. When to build who you build personalities. We're kind of, like, eccentric group because, you know, we work out, we eat healthy. So that doesn't fit in your food industry norm of operators. You know, normally they're coming from late hours, right. Alcohol. So they're just a little unhealthyish but we have huge success stories with the ones who did come to us, their weight loss journeys and that kind of stuff.

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Evonne Varady [00:31:00]:

Trying to think of what else we've done. Operational. Yeah. Menus, you know, fail.

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Angelo Esposito [00:31:08]:

I mean, that's. That's a. That's a tough one. You're like. I mean, it might give hope to, like, all our listeners because, like, the fact that, you know, typically our clients will change seasonally, maybe specials once a week. So one item a week, you're. You're. That's a tough one.

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Angelo Esposito [00:31:23]:

Like, you guys, like, I'm even processing that. Like, man, that's. That's a lot of work. Like, every week, a new item, a new menu is. That's a tough one. But then again, it's a bit of a. The flip side of that is it's a bit of a barrier to entry, because it's hard. It's hard to do what you're doing.

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Angelo Esposito [00:31:38]:

So as much as, like, on one side, that's not good, but on the flip side, it's hard for people to copy that.

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Evonne Varady [00:31:44]:

Yeah. Our food distributor loves us because I think we did, like, an audit, and there were, like, over a thousand ingredients. You know. You know, I'm just saying, like, just say your broccoli, your green beans, or just your vegetables. Like, we use every vegetable you can think of where, like, one restaurant usually just does broccoli or something, you know, or french fries. We use sweet potatoes. Sweet potato waffle fries. Sweet potato.

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Evonne Varady [00:32:06]:

You know, like, you can put sweet potatoes every which way that we do. So it's a. Yeah, we've had. I think that in the beginning, they wanted to put us in a box, and so you really have to hold on to your integrity and be like, no, this is what makes us different. This is what we want to do. And then when we went through COVID and everyone was kind of shutting their doors and our numbers were going up because we were already a delivery. Like, not delivery, but, you know, a carry out service with meals. They came to realize they're like, hey, yeah, we're sorry.

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Evonne Varady [00:32:38]:

You know, like, we understand now. And I was like, okay, so it was.

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Angelo Esposito [00:32:44]:

That's crazy. And, you know, it's funny. Cause I think about, like, the journey that you're going through, like, you know, I think he's at 25, 30 ish locations a year. What. What can, you know, if you were to pitch to maybe, you know, people listening that say, okay, what would make someone, let's say, get involved with this versus maybe another type of franchise? So in other words, who would be maybe an ideal, you know, franchisee for you?

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Evonne Varady [00:33:13]:

Our best owner operators are, believe it or not, our couples. We have a lot of married couples in our system, and most either one or both have a fitness background. And I'm not saying that's it, but I think if you're in the fitness world, you have. I mean, we are a people business. I mean, there's. Anybody can make chicken broccoli rice is what I always say, but it's what that customer service is and your relationship and your loyalty with that customer. So if you don't like helping people, then we can't. If you come to discovery day on us and you're like, yeah, I love your five revenues.

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Evonne Varady [00:33:50]:

Like, I'm just like, I can't wait to make money. And I'm like, eh, no, you're not the right person for us. So it's usually, I would say probably 99% of our owners have some sort of weight loss journey or some sort of something that they, you know, they, they've lost weight and they just want to help their community. Like, that's what we hear all the time. So we've had an owner who's down, like, 160 pounds. We had another one who's down 120 pounds. We've had to try and think, you know, just, it's like all those stories. So it.

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Evonne Varady [00:34:26]:

Our culture is really important to us with that.

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Angelo Esposito [00:34:30]:

That's amazing. And I think that's something that's interesting about your specific kind of world is like, and I mean, really, it should be in, in more places, but kind of marrying the two sides of, like, yeah, business, making money, but also kind of enjoying what I'm doing and, like, living a healthy lifestyle because there's a lot of ways to make money, but some will take years off your life kind of thing. And high stress. And not to say, like, any business has a certain level of high stress, don't get me wrong. But to hear people losing weight, living a healthier lifestyle, and, like, you know, being able to own and operate a successful business sounds pretty, pretty enticing. I'd love to hear, like, you know, you spoke about, you know, a lot of couples. That was actually a question I wanted to ask you. Right.

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Angelo Esposito [00:35:11]:

Because a lot of people will say you maybe sometimes here, you know, like, don't go into business with family or. So I love to hear your take on how it has been? It could. I know it could be a blessing, could be a curse, but love to hear your experience and what you say to, like, working with your, you know, partner, working with your husband. How has that been? And any lessons you can share?

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Evonne Varady [00:35:30]:

Yeah, it's. It's. He like, yes, we work great together. And I think the reason why, because we're such yin and yang, you know, like, I'm rainbows and unicorns, or I always say he's black and white and I'm 50 shades of gray. So I. And that you laugh because you, like, you know, exactly what type of, like, I'm over here looking at butterflies and unicorns, and he's like, systems, procedures. Like, you know. Yeah, his commas or whatever.

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Evonne Varady [00:35:58]:

I'm like, whatever. You know, I'll text him. But I think there are two reasons why couples work together. Because if you know anything about the restaurant business, you know that this is. I always say it's a baby. Like, you are up with it, and it's vomiting on you 365 days, seven days a week, like 24 hours a day. And it's good to have both of those people to go in with you because then you don't catch heat when you go home and, you know, an employee called in sick and you got to come in, like, no, you both want to be there, you know? So I feel like time value, it's great because you're both invested in it. And then I think the things that go wrong is when.

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Evonne Varady [00:36:38]:

That you both have the same personality. So if you both want to be in the back of the house, there's usually always. Our couples are usually. One wants to not be in front of people, and the other one is a total people person. So one does all the operations. One does, like, kind of the customer service. And that's how me and Don were. I did.

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Evonne Varady [00:36:56]:

I cooked because I love to cook, and he did all of our front of the house customers, you know, interactions, so. Yeah, but it's the couples who want control. Like, they are both control freaks.

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Angelo Esposito [00:37:10]:

Similar. That's interesting. And obviously, like, you have, you know, there's weight to what you're saying because you've. You've been at. Got this since 2011, I believe.

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Evonne Varady [00:37:20]:

Yeah, 2010.

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Angelo Esposito [00:37:22]:

You know, 2010. There you go. So, you know, 13. What is that, 13 years? Almost 14 years. So, like, there's not. It's not just like, you know, we're not hearing someone who's been in business with their husband for six months saying how. How you guys work. Well, it's.

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Angelo Esposito [00:37:35]:

It's, you know, ten plus years over a decade of. Of doing this, and, you know, 98 locations and building a real business, a real system. And I think there's probably a lesson there. It's even not only shed to, you know, couples, but I guess I would even say partnerships in general, because when you were talking about that, it was making me just think in general, like, a good partner usually is pretty complimentary, right? Like, there's similar skills in the sense of, like, maybe, you know, intelligent, this, that, but, like, it makes sense. Like, usually a good partner compliments you if you both have the same skills. It's kind of, there's a redundancy there of like, oh, we're both really strong in marketing. Well, who's doing finance? Who's doing the operation? Right. That's a good tip.

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Angelo Esposito [00:38:15]:

That's a really good tip. That's awesome. And what's next? What's next for you guys? It sounds like you guys are on a good trajectory. You're impacting lives not just financially, like from the franchisee point of view, but from the end consumer point of view. You're, you're impacting their, their health and their, their, their life. Um, adding 20 plus, 25 plus locations a year. What's kind of like the next steps for, for, for you and your husband? What do you, what do you guys want to achieve?

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Evonne Varady [00:38:42]:

Well, the first one is to reach the 100th location. So I'm really tired of being called an emerging brand. So I want to be, you know, what they call it. I'm going to lose my established brand. I want to be recognized in established brand. And I've heard, like, you know, you kind of get some recognition after that hundredth location. So we're two away. So I'm so excited about that. I think we'll hit it by the end of the year.

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Angelo Esposito [00:39:09]:

So let me ask you this, since, you know, this goes out to a lot of people, so we could do a quick shout out. We need two more people. How do they reach you? If someone's interested, this is probably a good, good quick segue. If someone is interested, they're hearing this story like, yeah, I'd like to learn more. How can they learn more about the franchise opportunity and what's the best way to kind of get there?

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Evonne Varady [00:39:32]:

Clean Eatz. Calm. And that's like he said, a z at the, it eats. And then at the bottom page, it's franchise. We have a whole franchise page. So just fill that out and then send it in and we'll have our brand one on the other end. And they reach out, talk to you, and if everything goes, they think you're a good fit. Then you come in here for a two day interview with us and we meet you and, you know, we always say your head and your heart have to align with this brand.

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Evonne Varady [00:40:00]:

And if it doesn't, then it's fine. Like, you know, we're just not. Right. But if both of those align, then we love to have you join the family.

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Angelo Esposito [00:40:09]:

Awesome. So you guys heard that Clean Eatz eats with a z.com and then franchise at the bottom. So that sounds great. Who knows? Maybe it'll be store number 100. That's pretty cool. Yeah, so that's awesome. And then, sorry to go back to the vision.

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Angelo Esposito [00:40:22]:

So obviously, at getting this message out, hitting that 100. Tell me more. What's. What's next for you guys?

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Evonne Varady [00:40:29]:

So then, yeah, it's getting. I mean, everyone, like, to reach a hundred. I know it's. It's not easy, but, like, things change. And so I think another little secret to franchising is you always think that you're bigger than what you are. So if you're at a hundred, I mean, we're operating like we have 150 or you're operating like you have 200. Because in the franchise world, I feel like everything moves at a snail's pace, you know? So when you realize that you've. You've outgrown everything, it's almost too late.

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Evonne Varady [00:41:00]:

So if you start preparing yourself, like, you're operating at a bigger scale than usually all your systems that you put in. But it's really tightening up our systems procedures on that. We are opening our corporate headquarters next month. So we have a huge training facility here in Wilmington, North Carolina, along with another cafe that we're opening so that we can train them in that. And then my mission, which we have our convention next Thursday. So we've been doing a fundraiser for September. September is childhood obesity. And, you know, being a farm kid with unhealthy options in that community, getting made for, like, my mom put me in husky boy jeans to go to school in because I was a little chubby kid.

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Evonne Varady [00:41:44]:

And so it's been a mission of mine to bring back the childhood, like, just have a voice for those kids. And so we did our first. We're in the process of doing our first fundraiser, and we partnered with camp. If I messed his name up, I better get it right. Pocono in Virginia or in Pennsylvania. I'm sorry. And it's like a camp where kids can go there and get help for eight weeks with their nutrition and their exercise. And so that's awesome.

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Evonne Varady [00:42:14]:

Huge for us. We're hoping our first goal is to raise $50,000. This, you know, within this four week period. So I think we're really close to it. So, yeah, give them back to the community. Um, yeah, I just. Just keep making us better, you know? Um, keep, keep making us, us. The gap between our competition is just a little bit bigger, getting more brand awareness out there.

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Evonne Varady [00:42:40]:

I don't think you can ever get enough brand awareness in your market.

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Angelo Esposito [00:42:44]:

Right. It's awesome that those are great initiatives. And I think that the fact that your vision and your mission's, like, very clear, you're gonna find the right people to help keep growing it, which you guys obviously have been doing a great job. And, you know, one kind of final thought that comes to mind is, you know, Clean Eatz, right? I love the name, but clean could be subjective. So I want to know from you, obviously, you have your definition of what is clean to you. What does clean food mean? I guess, for Clean Eatz in general.

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Evonne Varady [00:43:14]:

Clean to us means keeping the food at its natural state. So that's like not adding, you know, the butters, the salts to your broccoli to make it taste better. Broccoli does taste better. It's chicken. It's to use real chicken breasts that aren't loaded with sodium in it. The beef products, sauces, like, no high fructose corn syrup, as minimal ingredients as we possibly can. So, yeah, clean has been a debatable thing because some people think clean, and that means we're vegan, we're vegetarian, we're, you know, all that, we're all organic, you know, that stuff. But our state is, man, food tastes great without adding all the crap to it, so.

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Evonne Varady [00:44:01]:

Or even if you do want to add a little cheese to the, you know, broccoli or the queso, it's in portions and it's balanced. I think another big thing, our mission is that, you know, New Year's resolutions are coming, so everyone's, you know, they're already starting to think about that. But everyone goes so extreme. Like, we cut out everything to where we just set ourself up for failure. So it's, you can eat normal. You can eat a pizza on the weekends if you want to. It's about being balanced, and, and so that's really what we try to teach our customers when they come in. The door is like, it's okay, you know, we're only open six days, actually, we're open seven now, but we used to only be open six days.

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Evonne Varady [00:44:44]:

And we're like, that's your hall pass to go eat pizza on Sunday, you know? So, yeah, it's, if you go so extreme either, which way, none of us will ever succeed in that, so.

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Angelo Esposito [00:44:56]:

Right? Yeah, I think that there's magic there. And, like, just being consistent, like, just being as consistent as you can and, like, over a long enough period, you start seeing the results. And even just me on the personal side, like, I was never that, let's say big or whatever. But I did realize, and that's why I appreciate what you're doing, is, like, I don't. I don't think you'll realize, like, if you just take, like, a weighted average of, you know, let's say sleep, fitness and food. Like, food is a lot bigger than people think. You know what I mean? And I think that's one thing I realized, like, and sleep, too, actually. Like, yes, gym is super important.

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Angelo Esposito [00:45:28]:

Don't get me wrong. I know you're a gym person. I've been going to the gym quite often. I mean, probably not as much as you, but I appreciate the gym and sweating, and I feel good after. But I think people underestimate food. And it's like, for me, a quick story I just want to share is, like, I remember years ago, but I used to go to this boxing gym, and after, like, I don't know, two, three months, I saw this guy, and he went from having kind of, like a big beer belly to, like, a six pack, and I was like, man. And I'll never forget, we're in the locker room, and I was always, I told him, I'm like, shit, man, that skip rope and the boxing, really? And he's like, that helped. But he was all clean eating.

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Angelo Esposito [00:46:00]:

I did this in the kitchen, and I was like, it really stuck with me. And I think that's one message maybe to share with our audience for people who are kind of motivated to get in shape and feel their best is like, and maybe you can touch on this. But, like, what, you know, how important is the food aspect when thinking about, you know, the trifecta, food, gym, and sleep?

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Evonne Varady [00:46:20]:

I mean, it's super important. I mean, I would. You could almost skip. I don't want to say you want to skip the working out part, but as long as your diet's in check, you know, and your sleep, like you said, sleep, stress, all that stuff plays such a big thing. But, man, I was like, you know, going to that boxing gym, you probably, like, burn 400, maybe 600 calories. You can consume that in, like, one meal, right? And we got about three or four meals that we consume a day or the snacking in between type of stuff. So you can see how that, like, blows it out of proportion. And it's so bad to, you know, knowing that you've eaten something in the morning and you're like, I have all day.

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Evonne Varady [00:46:59]:

I gotta get this off. But, man, it's. It's also too, like, the mindset, you know, like, I know the buffets, COVID kind wiped out a lot of the buffets, but, you know, we always went to go get our money's worth too. And so, like, you know, loading up and the bigger portion sizes, we just got way out of reality with all of that. So, you know, healthy eating, it's like the. Look how much it causes. Look how much it caused our body. Like diabetes, the heart conditions, just your joints.

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Evonne Varady [00:47:36]:

You don't sleep well if you're overweight, you know, so it just ties into so much. And there's a lot of good stuff out there to eat. So I'm not saying that, but it's in moderation. So if you can just get that part balanced, like, you can still have your cookies and milk, you know, it just.

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Angelo Esposito [00:47:51]:

Yeah, yeah.

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Evonne Varady [00:47:52]:

Have them every night while you're on the couch chilling.

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Angelo Esposito [00:47:56]:

I know in 2015, you started the franchise, and it seems like a couple of years later, there was something called Clean Eatz kitchen. Can you touch on what Clean Eatz kitchen is?

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Evonne Varady [00:48:07]:

Yeah. So Clean Eatz kitchen is our nationwide delivery service. We started this in 2017 for two reasons, because we only had twelve locations at that time. So in order to get our franchise owners a great food contracts, we had to become a little bit bigger than what we currently work, and also for national branding. We couldn't act like we were bigger if we couldn't supply to all the states. So the kitchens, we have four of them. There's one in Salt Lake City, St. Louis, Missouri, and then two here in Wilmington, North Carolina.

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Evonne Varady [00:48:42]:

They are all USDA inspections and FDA. And what makes that kind of cool is, well, not cool. Like, we have an inspector in our facilities at all every day. Every day. Which is great, because it's like you guys who order meals with the little bugs on them. You should know that they really do come in and inspect your product and make sure you're using the proper ingredients, make sure it's safe for the consumers to use. But, yeah, it's really grown. COVID was really good to us.

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Evonne Varady [00:49:15]:

We picked up a lot of Medicare contracts. The meals on wheels were paused, so we took over the north, most of North Carolina's meals on wheels to the elderly. We have a lot of NBA contracts. We just did the g league last year. We're on the Olympics this year to sponsor, I think, the women's basketball, gymnastics, and soccer, maybe. I think soccer. And then what's really cool, like, we're in Wilmington, North Carolina, which is jacksonville, North Carolina, which is Camp lejeune, which is. That's our marine base.

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Evonne Varady [00:49:50]:

Tons of marines go out there. They called us up one day and told us, asked us for a meeting on base. And so we were like, okay. And so I had no idea. Like, look, we were two gym rats. I was in beauty shorts, crop top, you know, I did not meet their dress code whatsoever. I have been kicked out of the base one time for the dress code, but they. They let me come back.

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Evonne Varady [00:50:15]:

So, anyway, we walk into this long conference table, and this colonel was sitting at the table, and he's like, we have a problem. I was like, I thought we were in trouble. And he was like, we have 50 marines who are about ready to get discharged. He's like, they're overweight. He's like, do you think your meals can help us? And I was like, of course. You know, again, if you're an entrepreneur, say yes and then figure out. Figured out after your parachute. However, my husband kicked me underneath the table at the time because he's like, when do you want.

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Evonne Varady [00:50:45]:

All right, so when do you want them delivered? He's like, Monday. This was Thursday. And I was like, yeah, gotcha. So, from underneath the table kick. But that was, like, the best contract ever. So just because you said yes, by the way, all 50 marines passed with flying colors, and none of them got discharged. And so that created an alliance with us and the Marines super quick. So now we are in every marine base in the US.

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Evonne Varady [00:51:16]:

So if you go on, the things are the MCXs. We're all there. And then we just. Our Japan reached out to us probably at the beginning of the year, and our first shipment just arrived last week with 10,000 meals over to Japan. So that was super cool. We're hoping it works, and then we would go into all of the bases overseas. So kind of cool that your meals were on a shipping container head, no?

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Angelo Esposito [00:51:46]:

Yeah, that's a. Wow. That's a huge milestone. And I think, you know, to your point, there's a lesson there. Cause I feel the same way, and I'm sure a lot of entrepreneurs do, is like, kind of, like you said, jump off and then figure out how the parachute works. And, you know, sometimes it backfires, but most of the time, it'll lead to something. And to your point, you took that risk. You're like, oh, we'll figure it out.

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Angelo Esposito [00:52:04]:

First of all, it's crazy that all 50 passed, like, 100% pass, I think speaks to something, so congrats on that. But then the fact that it led to these bigger contracts, now you're, you know, in all, most of these bases, so, like, that's huge. So, you know, to our listeners, I think sometimes take that leap of faith and figure it out as you go. It's. It's never gonna be perfect. And if you feel like it's perfect, chances are you waited too long.

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Evonne Varady [00:52:28]:

I was laughing because I just talked to our original lady who helped us. You know, like, if you solve our operations back in 2017, you would totally laugh. Like, again, you figure this out, you wing it until you make it, and you just, like, just. Just put your head down and just keep going. But I was talking to her the other day, and she's like, you guys still are our number one seller besides alcohol and tobacco, so I feel pretty good about that.

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Angelo Esposito [00:52:54]:

That's amazing. Well, look, that's great. So. So that's really cool. So clean. cleanneeds.com. And they got clean needs kitchen. Cleanings kitchen.

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Angelo Esposito [00:53:01]:

You guys do a lot of big contracts, but clean needs kitchen. Just to be clear, can it also be just for, like, individuals? Like, if I wanted to order from cleaning's kitchen can. Okay. Okay. So that's awesome. You kind of got these two arms.

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Evonne Varady [00:53:11]:

Yep. So we, I know it sounds like we have a lot, but there's only 98 locations, and that's that people still don't even know who we are. Right? So clean's kitchen just lets us get our word out there. And it's great. Those of you guys who are franchising who are looking for leads because they usually eat our product, and this was a great marketing tool to get new leads in to buy franchises. So probably, I would say probably at least 60% of our leads that come in for franchising have ordered the Clean Eatz kitchen or saw it somewhere.

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Angelo Esposito [00:53:41]:

And that's how that speaks volume, which is great because that means, like, the customer now wants to become a franchise, which speaks to believing in the product in the vision, which I think is a great way to build up that franchise. So kudos to you because that's super smart, and I think that'll create a stronger network of franchisees.

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Evonne Varady [00:54:03]:

So that's a red flag if they haven't eaten your meals and they want to buy your franchise. Like, it's too easy to get a meal in your hand these days. So, yeah, we're just like, if you haven't eaten our product, how do you, how do you convene, believe in it. So that's a big thing for us, too.

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Angelo Esposito [00:54:20]:

That's amazing. Well, thank you for sharing that. So cleaneatz.com again, eats with a Z and then Clean Eatz kitchen as well for delivery. And it's really cool to hear that you're getting these really big contracts. So congrats. I'm excited. We got to celebrate. When you get to the hundredth location, two away, I don't know what you're doing, but I'm there.

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Angelo Esposito [00:54:38]:

Count me in. I want to celebrate with you guys. So a nice milestone. Amazing.

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Evonne Varady [00:54:44]:

Thank you.

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Angelo Esposito [00:54:45]:

I love it. And then maybe to wrap things up for people listening who are, you know, restaurant owners or, you know, they're. They're figuring out they're maybe in their early days, any kind of words of wisdom, like, you, you've done it. You know, you. I mean, you're still doing it, but you've gone from jumping in with both feet and sleeping at the venue to. To where you are today. So any kind of looking back, sometimes I think it's easier to connect the dots. So when you look back, any kind of words of wisdom you can maybe share with some of our fellow entrepreneurial listeners?

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Evonne Varady [00:55:14]:

Oh, man. I would have to say back to kind of like, there's no plan b. Like, if your heart and your head aligns with this and you have a vision and you have a mission, then there should be nothing that stops you. Like, it's the work ethic. I know we've all kind of lost a little bit of that. I feel like it's taking chances. It's being able to lay everything on the line knowing, because if you can't lay everything on the line for your business, how do you expect someone coming in who wants to buy your franchise to lay it all on the line, you know, following your gut. I have a really good gut.

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Evonne Varady [00:55:57]:

My gut speaks to me a lot. And, I mean, that's a real thing. So trust your gut. Keep your integrity. There's a lot of snakes out there that make it very convenient for you to bend your principles. And that's all you have is your word and your integrity. So make sure those stay intact throughout this process.

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Angelo Esposito [00:56:22]:

I love it. I'm turning that into short. That was great. That was a great snippet. So thank you for sharing that. Once again, we're here with Evonne Varady, co-founder at Clean Eatz with a Z.com. And for those interested in hearing the story, we're going to be posting this on all our social channels, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, you name it. LinkedIn too.

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Angelo Esposito [00:56:45]:

And for those interested in maybe an opportunity who are into this space, you can go check out cleaneatz.com. Evonne, thank you so much for taking the time to chat with me today and to tell your story.

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Evonne Varady [00:56:56]:

Thank you guys.

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Angelo Esposito [00:56:59]:

Feel free to check out WISK.ai for more resources and schedule a demo with one of our product specialists to see if it's a fit for.

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