Hospitality
Spong has helped launch both food tech companies and some of the provinceâs most popular brick-and-mortar eateries. COVID forced a pause, but despite that economic turbulence, the serial entrepreneur is back to biting off everything he can chew
By Nathan Caddell /
Youâve just opened locations in Squamish and Burnaby. Those were your 10th and 11th, and you have plans for two more this year, in White Rock and Langford. Why the aggressive expansion now?
We were planning on expanding pre-COVIDâthings were moving along. One restaurant per year for five years or something like that. There were things we were playing around with in terms of style, as every Tacofino feels a little bit different. But also figuring out if we were going to expand beyond B.C.âwe were thinking about Toronto. Then the pandemic hit and that all stopped.
Toronto-fino? Really?
Cord Jarvie of had helped build a couple of Tacofino locations, Oasis and Ocho. He was back and forth to Toronto. But then everything went sideways and everybody went into survival mode. Over the last year or so itâs felt like weâre on solid ground. There are threats of a recession, but what we do is pretty accessible. In the world of $45 duck sandwiches, we have a $14 burritoâa good lunch or dinner for $20 with a drink. Weâre feeling good about the product weâre putting out, and relatively good about the world.
Would you say youâre about back to where you were pre-COVID days?
I would say weâre probably up a bit as a company. It varies by location. People still havenât returned to Gastown in the same way, for a variety of reasons. The financial district in Vancouver is still recovering as wellânot everyone has returned to work.
You talk about making sure all the locations have their own vibe. Is that challenging to do when youâre opening up so many so quickly?
If you try to tailor it to whatâs happening in that specific neck of the woods, you can maintain a level of personality and autonomy. Weâve always wanted to get into a neighbourhood and give it what it wants. In Squamish, we sponsored a big skate competition and the location launch centred on a burrito you could take with you. People there are driven by the outdoorsâthey want to get in, grab something and then enjoy the surroundings. But weâre wholly owned. We have the luxury of growing at the pace we want. We donât have to just pump out carbon copies.
Squamish has a unique vibe, but what about Burnaby or White Rock? How do you capture those places?
Theyâre both going to be a grab-and-go style. I donât know if I can comment on what Burnaby is, but when you think about what else is going on there, youâve got the big chainsâCactus, Earlsâall right there. Can we do something cool and different with some personality? Thatâs what weâre looking at. I grew up around Metrotown. Thereâs a lot of grab-and-go stuff you can get in the mall, but not a lot of options outside of that.
And what about ? You have locations in Vancouver and Victoria that seem to be extremely popular. Are you expanding that brand?
Weâre looking for a second location in Vancouver as we speak. I think itâs going to be a bit smallerâsomewhere that wouldnât be competing with the other one; something relatively urban. Weâre expecting that itâs going to be a tough year and maybe weâll see more places come available. Funnily enough, despite whateverâs gone on, there arenât a ton of awesome spots out there. Itâs shocking how tight the rental market still is.
You do see a lot of empty storefronts, though.
Do you? Maybe Iâm just picky.
You sold off corporate catering platform to French food services giant Sodexo in 2021. What led to that decision, and was it a hard one?
It was a difficult time for restaurants. It was quite difficult personally because our business was DoorDash for the office, basically. We specialized in knitting together multiple restaurant orders to satisfy large groups. That business was transaction-basedâyou can imagine what the pandemic did to our top line. There were seven bidders, but I feel really blessed, to borrow a hashtag, that we found Sodexo.
And youâre still doing work for Sodexo, right?
Yeah, Iâve got a role there. Iâve handed over leadership of Foodee to former COO and now CEO Barb Anderson. Iâm the executive VP of retail food strategy and corporate development. I lead culinary and restaurant partnerships and Iâm having a lot of fun with it.
Youâre also one of the advisors for the beverage startup , and youâve got your own investment company, . Anything interesting youâve got your eye on with that right now?
Food-wise, not recently. Itâs something Iâm starting to think about in terms of making angel investments and other food concepts as well. I really enjoy the process of taking something from zero to one. I love Tacofino and Superbaba, obviously. Iâve always got other genres of food that Iâd like to explore as well in the back of my head. Itâs not out of the question for the future.